


Dream A Little Dream Of Me

by loserladder



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Post Season 6, unreality
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-01 02:41:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 23,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15133313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loserladder/pseuds/loserladder
Summary: Keith has dreams, strange ones, and all of them seem to center around Lance, who he has just met by chance. Only, as the dreams continue, it becomes unclear what is real. Keith can't shake the feeling that he knows Lance, and even more than that, loves him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys, my name's jared i'm 19 and i never learned how to fucking write, but here i am. i'm editing as i go, but my goal is to have this done by the end of the month, so buckle in y'all.

Keith takes the seat closest to the door. The professor doesn’t notice, almost pointedly, and Keith lets loose a breath he had been holding onto. No one in the class seems to notice that Keith doesn’t belong here, and with the professor staunchly refusing to award late students with attention, Keith lets himself relax into the tiny half-desk.

 

Of course, another five minutes later when Keith has begun to really breathe, the door slams open, and an actual late student runs through, panting.

 

“I’m so sorry,” he says, hands on his jeaned knees and head bowed. Even hunched over, the student is around the professor’s height, something the professor seems to be aware of because he stands a little taller as he raises a single eyebrow and waves in the direction of the seats.

 

“It’s your attendance record, not mine,” the professor grumbles. He is exactly the sort of man people would expect to teach a class like this, lightly balding and a little hunched over in the way that is indicative of a lot of time spent in front of a small screen. The mustache on his face twitches more than his actual mouth does as the late student winces at his words.

 

The student rights himself, running long, dark fingers through his hair, and Keith finds himself a bit breathless for other reasons other than anxiety for once. The guy looks around with dark blue eyes that make Keith want to sink straight into the floor when they fall on him, and more specifically, the only free seat left, next to him.

 

With only a small quiver of his mouth in disappointment, he takes his place next to Keith. The rows of desks are narrow, but the desks are fairly small as well and the distance between Keith’s elbow and the stranger’s is abysmally small. The professor has already reverted back to the subject, but Keith can hardly pay attention while the new guy is shuffling through his things and leaning over his desk in a way that has his shirt riding up, just enough around the waistband. Keith could die. He’s never looked at someone and felt like this before, like every nerve has come alive and every warning sign is ringing.

 

Have they met before? Maybe when Keith was a student? But that had been at least a year ago, and this guy looks like a freshman, with his stuffed backpack and polo that meets tight jeans. There’s something young about him, maybe in the way he can’t seem to sit still, even when he has his things in order on his desk and pen poised in his hand.

 

The guy’s eyes dart to where Keith has been unabashedly staring and immediately dart back. There is a stiff line to his shoulders now, a stillness that looks practiced, and his expression only becomes more frigid as he turns to meet Keith’s gaze again.

 

“Can I help you?” the guy hisses, eyes narrowed into a glare. Keith taps his fingers on the desk, absentmindedly keeping the beat the stranger had abandoned, and watches as blue eyes dart to his hand and back. “Are you really wearing fingerless gloves right now?”

 

Keith finds himself frowning at that. “Which one of those questions would you like me to answer first?”

 

A bit of the dude’s hair flies upward as he huffs. His pointy chin becomes more prominent when he tilts his head back to address Keith again. “Why are you staring at me?”

 

Keith makes a show of thinking about it for a moment, finger on his chin. It seems to irk the stranger even more, and while Keith has never considered himself a true instigator, it’s a little funny. “You’re very late.” So was Keith, but he doesn’t need to know that.

 

There’s a light darkening of the boy’s cheekbones that has Keith immediately endeared and entranced. He obviously cares about being here, something Keith had always lacked, even when he had been a student. “It’s none of your business, but I was actually considering dropping this class.”

 

Keith’s eyebrows furrow in confusion. “Why would you want to drop this class?”

 

The guy boggles at him. If he hadn’t thought Keith was odd before, his question has definitely pushed it over the line. “It’s about analyzing conspiracy theories. I could just watch, like, four different documentaries online and cover all the content of this class. It’s not like it will help me in the real, sane world.”

 

Keith isn’t quite sure how to handle that, considering almost all his time outside of work is spent researching and watching documentaries, but instead of saying that, he rests his chin on the palm of his hand and leans forward slightly. “What is it you want to do in the real, sane world?”

 

The stranger bites white teeth down on his pink, soft-looking lips, and Keith finds himself momentarily distracted as he answers, “I want to do something in marketing, probably. I don’t know.”

 

“Well, as a member of the real, sane world, I’m pretty sure part of a job is being able to analyze data and understand multiple interpretations, especially if you’re going to be doing something in marketing, where it’s your job to sell people one particular interpretation,” Keith says lowly. A zing of something has Keith smirking, even when the guy’s eyes narrow back into a glare, instead of the curious, taken aback expression from before. Keith kind of likes this too, with his pouty lips and sharp cheekbones.

 

“Dick,” the stranger responds, just a touch too loud.

 

“McClain,” the professor calls, obviously annoyed with having been interrupted again. “Is there something you and our other late tag-along have to say that you want to share, or can it wait at least until the discussion part of this class?”

 

The guy, McClain’s, shoulders straighten the moment he is addressed. Keith finds himself also straightening, chin jutting out despite the fact he should definitely be trying to make himself as unrecognizable as possible. “Sorry, sir. It can wait, sir.”

 

“Glad to hear it,” the professor states sarcastically, and folds back into his lecture like he had never left.

 

McClain shoots Keith another dark look, but otherwise keeps his attention straight ahead for the rest of the hour, and Keith tries to do the same. He really does, but even while McClain is obviously trying to sit as still and innocuous as possible, he is constantly moving. His long fingers tap his pen against his leg, or his knee starts jumping, or worse than anything, he runs his fingers through his hair and bites his lip, and Keith is unforgivably distracted by every motion.

 

The class ends, and the professor gives them chapters to read, slipping the title of the book. Keith makes a note on his arm to buy the book before next class. McClain is shuffling slowly, sending Keith unsubtle and sharp looks. Keith just, cannot help himself.

 

After they both have stood, he crosses the small distance between their desks, giving McClain an obvious once over. There’s a slight darkening in McClain’s cheeks again, and Keith knows it was ridiculous to even pretend like he wasn’t eventually going talk to him again.

 

Keith holds out his hand. “I’m Keith. Will you be there next class, or are you still considering dropping?”

 

McClain seems to fight with himself before taking Keith’s hand, fingerless gloves and all. It’s warm and incredibly soft against Keith’s more calloused fingers. “I might drop, especially if everyone in this class is like you, Keith.”

 

“I don’t think there’s anyone here like me,” Keith says blandly. McClain’s face goes through a series of expressions before settling on something that isn’t quite annoyance but isn’t exactly fond either.

 

McClain rolls his eyes and drops Keith’s hand. “I can’t tell if that was a serious statement of you feeling superior or if it was a bad attempt at flirting.”

 

“Which would you prefer?” Keith asks, finding himself fighting a small smile again.

 

“Now _that_ is bad flirting,” McClain answers.

 

“Only if you want it to be,” Keith responds just as quickly. “What’s your name? You never said.”

 

McClain seems to weigh his options. “It’s Lance.”

 

Keith has that feeling again, the one where it feels like every nerve or extra sense he has goes off at once. The unshakable familiarity sits heavy inside him, and the name slips out of Keith’s mouth as if he has said it a million times. “Lance. Nice to meet you.”

 

“I’d say likewise, but I’m not so sure,” Lance says, blue eyes running over Keith distrustfully. He seems to eyeball Keith’s jacket before eyeing Keith’s ankles. Keith wants to peak down at his own clothing, but he already knows he wore his dark jeans and boots today. A part of him wants to know what Lance sees when he looks at Keith, but not enough to ask.

 

“You want me to be flirting with you. You have to have some idea,” Keith tells him instead.

 

Lance uncrosses his arms and picks up his bag. “Whatever you want to believe, weirdo,” he says as he walks away. He looks back to find Keith watching him go and makes a face.

 

Keith may stand there for a couple of seconds too long watching Lance trot out the door, and is almost the last person to leave. Not a very good idea if he’s going to keep sneaking into this class for the rest of the term. He has to play a bit safer, even if it means skipping out on talking to Lance.

 

Maybe Lance won’t come back.

 

* * *

 

Keith dreams, sometimes. Occasionally about his parents: standing at his father’s grave, staring at the bits and pieces his mother had left behind in their house when she’d left. Sometimes it’s about school, the rush of classes and awards, being told how bright his future was. Tonight, though, it’s about Lance.

 

It isn’t the typical sort of dream Keith would have about an attractive guy he has come across. There’s nothing typical about it at all, considering Keith starts the dream from the inside of a cockpit.

 

His hands fly over the controls with the ease he normally only has for taking care of his bike. He’s fighting something, the purple ships stark against the endless black void of space. Around him are a thousand small burning suns, all so very far away, but Keith isn’t focused on things like that right now. He’s focused on flying, weaving, dodging. There are closer things exploding around him than stars.

 

Keith runs a maneuver that has him turning left, out of harm’s way, at the very last moment, followed by a loud explosion he can feel more than hear, and Keith’s comm bursts to life in his helmet. It’s Lance, his face sweaty and eyes mostly shielded by his helmet, but Keith can tell he’s displeased by the downturn of his mouth.

 

“Dude, what are you doing? Stop showing off, you’ll get yourself killed,” Lance gripes. A giant blue robotic cat flies over Keith’s head, and some part of Keith knows that Lance is in there, just as he knows he is in something similar. There’s a warmth inside him that is both foreign and familiar, the bond between him and the almost sentient being housing him.

 

Keith feels himself scowl. His attention is mostly on the task at hand, and he can’t bring himself to look at the Lance onscreen as he says, “I’m not showing off. I’m trying to make sure we win.”

 

“You don’t have to do it single-handedly, you know,” Lance retorts, a fraction too harsh. Keith knows it stems from jealousy, from sour grapes that Lance can never seem to get over, but there’s this tiny part of Keith that wants nothing more than for Lance to actually worry about Keith, instead of that.

 

Keith can think of a thousand things he could say to make it better, to try and pave the way for an actual conversation with Lance, but he doesn’t. He can’t control his mouth, can only ride along in his own body as his frown deepens into something mean. Lance is pouting as he glares again, which Keith still finds distracting, even if he knows this is a dream. Keith’s body snorts dramatically. “Sure I don’t. I have Pidge and Hunk helping, don’t I?” he hears himself say.

 

Lance’s face twists, and the tiny screen he had appeared on vanishes, leaving Keith mostly alone in the cockpit once more.

 

Maybe it’s the frustration with not being able to control his actions that breaks him out of the dream so violently. Keith wakes covered in a thin layer of sweat, panting harshly and leaning over the bed. His head pounds, and he rubs his temples with shaking hands. The glare of his phone lighting in the dark reminds him of where he is.

 

He’ll just have to shower before work today.

 

* * *

 

Lance comes back to class. He’s already sitting in the seat next to Keith’s desk by the door, this time voluntarily, back straightening the moment his slightly bored gaze falls on Keith. The professor doesn’t even pause in his lecture, despite how late Keith is, but Lance’s eyes don’t leave Keith until Keith has settled into his seat and is able to look back.

 

Keith wishes he was a stronger man, but the combination of the unsettling dream and that burning feeling of familiarity has him leaning over and saying, “I see you didn’t end up dropping.”

 

Lance’s pen is making a dull clicking noise as it hits his other arm in an unending rhythm. “Not yet. I’ve decided to give it a couple weeks, see if it really is as useless as I think it’ll be.” He’s facing the front of the classroom, not looking at Keith, but he’s leaned closer, as if to hear better when Keith speaks.

 

“Glad to hear it, but I have to say,” Keith says, also leaning closer. Lance’s pen stops clicking. “I might be a bit distracted now that you’ve decided to stay.”

 

Lance’s head whips around, blue eyes wide as they meet Keith’s. The tapping has stopped. Keith allows himself a very small smile, and Lance’s eyes only seem to go wider.

 

“Turn around, unless you want him to call you out again,” Keith admonishes after Lance’s shocked expression morphs into something closer to unbridled curiosity. Lance eyes him as if he thinks Keith is something unseen or unheard of by humankind and he’s trying to figure out whether Keith means him any harm, but he turns back to the front. Keith can’t stop himself from adding, “And if you were wondering, that was flirting.”

 

Lance shoots him another look, considerably less existential. “I got that, thanks.”

 

“You just seemed to have some trouble distinguishing last time. I figured I would help clear it up.” Lance rolls his eyes and turns back to the front.

 

The straight line of Lance’s shoulders is very distracting, Keith finds, as are the curls on the back of Lance’s neck and around his ears, and the constant motion of his hands. Keith can’t shake a sense of comfort, like Lance is something both expected and unexpected all at once, like a favorite song he hasn’t heard in a while. Keith is here for a reason, sitting in a classroom he has no business being in, but it’s one he has to remind himself of every time his attention is stolen from today’s lecture of Area 51 by the way Lance has started biting the end of his pen.

 

By the end, Keith has absorbed only some of it, to his endless frustration, but he catches himself still watching Lance out of the corner of his eye.

 

Lance moves slowly, shooting glances at Keith as well. With a huff, Lance crosses the small divide. “So, do you want my number or not?” he asks, obviously annoyed with having to be the one who asks.

 

“Do you even want to give me your number?” Keith sort of blurts, slightly surprised and maybe a little panicked. He had been fancying Lance as a class time only crush, especially after that disconcerting dream and the weird feelings Keith still can’t shake. The upbeat in his heart rate has his palms sweating, and his fingers tighten around the strap of his bag he’s pulled over his shoulder.

 

Lance gives Keith a very slow, obvious once over that does nothing for Keith’s pulse skyrocketing. “Lord knows why. I mean, between the hair, boots, and fingerless gloves, you clearly have no idea what you look like.” Lance steps a little bit closer to Keith then, and while they have to be at least the same height, there’s something in the way that Lance tilts his head that has Keith feeling just a half-inch shorter. “But also, you must have _no idea_ the way you look right now. I’m surprised most of the class hasn’t been distracted by you.”

 

Keith is definitely not a teenager anymore, but he can feel his heartbeat in his ears and every inch of his skin feels tight and hot like it had for his first crush. Lance stays in Keith’s space for a moment longer, eyes darting to Keith’s mouth and away, before pulling back and looking very pleased with himself.

 

“That, Keith, was flirting,” Lance says with a slow smile. He reaches over and grabs Keith’s arm, moving the sleeve of Keith’s jacket up just enough that it exposes the mostly faded but still there name of the textbook. Clicking his damnable pen, Lance writes a series of digits on Keith’s arm and gives him a wink. “Call me if you need any help analyzing data, okay?”

 

“Sure,” Keith says, slightly dazed. Lance walks away, and once again, Keith watches him go. “Fuck.”

 

“I’ve been meaning to ask for your name,” the professor says from his desk up front. Keith looks around the classroom before realizing he is the last one left. “Are you transferring into my class? I don’t seem to have you on the attendance sheet.”

 

Keith sighs internally. “I’m working some stuff out with the financial aid department. It make take another week or so.”

 

The professor nods and waves Keith to the door. “Alright, just keep my updated.”

 

“Will do,” Keith says. He leaves the classroom and looks down the hall both ways before letting himself huff. “Double fuck.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy fourth of july, i've got my hat on backwards and i'm ready to fucking party. shout out to La_Temperanza and CodenameCarrot for making these text skins possible. out there, doing the lord's work, giving nerdy plebes like me resources. 
> 
> thank you for the sweet comments, hopefully this is a good follow up! this work will probably be about five chapters, but there is.... a lot of ground to cover before then. so we'll see.

This is a dream, but it feels almost too real.

 

Keith is walking down a hallway in his home that is also not his home. Everything is cold metal but not actually metal, an emotionless white but not white. Keith is totally comfortable walking to the showers in his underwear and bare feet, a pile of clean clothes in his arms under a towel. He yawns as the doors slide apart to let him enter, and his eyes are closed, which is why he doesn’t see Lance until he runs head first into him.

 

“Dude! Come on!” Lance exclaims, loud and annoying even this early in the morning. Keith scowls and turns from where he has been picking up his clothes to tell him to fuck off when he finally actually sees Lance.

 

Lance is all soft, tan skin that dips and curves down into a towel on his waist. Only a towel. Droplets of water fall off the sideways curl of his hair and run down the hollow of Lance’s throat, entrancing and inviting all at once. Keith thinks he stops breathing, especially when Lance reaches up to run fingers through his wet hair, the muscles of his arm and chest moving. 

 

Keith wants, right then, wants to push Lance up against the wall, even though he is definitely the shorter one here. He wants to bite up and down Lance’s throat, trace every line of hair on his body, wants to press himself so firmly against Lance that neither of them is sure where one begins and the other ends. 

 

The feeling matches Keith’s waking interest in Lance, then burns through him like a small sun. It goes so much deeper than Keith could imagine, as if all the irritation and annoyance, all the fighting, snowballs into something that could bring Keith to his knees. 

 

Instead, Keith takes a breath, ignoring how Lance smells clean, like the soap they all share and vaguely like citrus, and says as calmly as he can, “You could have watched where you were going too, you know.”

 

“You always walk around here like you own the place, well, news flash! We share the bathroom,” Lance continues as if Keith had said nothing. His hands move around his face theatrically, and Keith can feel that low ball of annoyance that sits at the center of his wanting. 

 

“You spend far more time in here than I do,” Keith reminds him, trying very hard not to roll his eyes. Lance is obviously not sure if this is an insult or not, and while Keith hadn’t meant it to be, this entire exchange has already exhausted him enough that he doesn’t want to explain one way or the other. 

 

“I have a very particular moisturizing routine,” Lance states defensively, crossing his arms. Keith refuses to look anywhere other than his face. “There are no shortcuts when the end result is this.” With a wave of his hand, he motions to his own face.

 

Keith’s frown deepens. “Skin?” he guesses.

 

Lance sighs and rests his fingers gently against his forehead, as if Keith has deeply disappointed him. “Clear and beautiful skin, you absolute heathen. Come closer, look at my pores.”

 

Keith finds himself drawn in by Lance’s hand and struggles to pull back slightly, just to get some air to breathe. It’s all too much, really, from Lance’s face being so close to his own, to being encouraged to just. Stare at Lance, when he has never, ever needed encouragement there, to his own dismay. “It looks… Clean?”

 

Lance just sighs again and pushes him away. “You’re hopeless. Fine, have fun with your awkward scrubbing and five minute cold showers.” With that, Lance begins to walk away. Keith desperately wants to say something, anything, as the annoyance fades back into something that sits too close to longing. Maybe Keith could say that it works for him, whatever his routines are, that his skin is so soft that Keith wants to touch him everywhere, that-

 

Maybe none of that, on second thought. Things are better like this, feelings curled inside Keith like an angry cat. Keith watches him go, turns into the bathroom. 

 

He wakes up, sprawled in sweaty sheets again, with a very intense feeling his gut that something isn’t right, something isn’t normal with these dreams. He lies back down and thinks.

 

Keith had felt it all this time: the crisp air of the controlled environment on his bare skin, the burning in his gut that was shame and anger and desire, and the knowledge that nothing he said or did would matter because he couldn’t actually change anything.

 

Going back to the class after the professor said something is risky, he knows that much. Keith lifts his arm and looks at the numbers written in the dim light coming in from the window. He’s avoided showering just to keep them like for the past day, and they are only slightly smudged, even after his last shift. 

 

If he had thought his feelings were odd before this last dream, now, Keith has no conceptual comparison. In fact, Keith can think of no one who has brought out every tiny feeling and made it into something so huge in Keith’s chest, where his ribs feel like cracking from holding it all in. His breath is still shaky, trying to catch up with all of it, to push it away and remind himself that even while it had been a very realistic dream, that’s all it had been.  

 

Keith tries, but he still moves over to grab his phone on the nightstand and opens up his texts to type out Lance’s number slowly. Each number takes two heartbeats, but sending it feels like proving something to himself, like he isn’t the strangely reserved Keith of his dreams. When Lance answers a moment later, Keith feels solid, untouched by dream Keith’s tidal wave of emotions.

Hey, it’s Keith. You up?  
  
unfortunately. i have an exam i have to study for. why are you awake? besides to text me at 2 a.m.  
  


Keith’s eyes dart to the clock in surprise. Is it really that late? The sun isn’t up, he can see that much, but he hadn’t even thought about the time before texting.

Shit, sorry. I just had a very weird dream. You were in it.  
  
was i? interesting.  
How is that interesting?  
  
i’ve had a couple dreams of you too  
  
  


Keith pauses a second. When he finally goes to type out a response, another message pops up.

i've had a couple dreams of you too  
  
not those kinds of dreams, don't make it nasty  
  
I wasn’t going to. Jeez.  
  
you’re the one texting me at 2 a.m. how am i supposed to know you’re not just trying for a booty call of some kind  
  
I think you have a very skewed perspective of me, if that is what you think this is.  
  
hm, let’s see. 1) you start off by flirting with me (poorly) 2) you text me in the wee hours of the night, talking about how you have been dreaming about me 3) you wear a red leather jacket. all the evidence is wracking up  
  
What does my jacket have to do with anything?  
  
everyone knows shady guys wear leather jackets  
  
I’m not that shady.  
really. then why have i not seen you around campus once, except for the one class we have. and before you say it’s pretty big, it really is not. i feel like i know everybody, and nobody seems to know you.  
  
Okay, so I’m shady enough that I sneak onto campus to go to the one class, but it’s not that weird.  
  
how is that not weird?????  
  
I used to go to school there. I just got kicked out  
  
oh my god, for what?  
  
Fighting? But it’s really not my fault, the guy was such a dick  
  
another student?  
  
...... A professor. But he would not leave me the fuck alone, and he was such a raging asshole to everybody. It wasn’t just out of nowhere.  
  
see, that? is the definition of shady, buddy.   
  
It’s not that shady. I did the whole anger management group thing. It was part of my probation.  
  
this is just getting better and better. i find one cute guy on campus and he’s some townie who sneaks in to learn about conspiracy theories and wear leather in front of innocent bystanders  
  
So you do think I’m cute.  
  
hm look at the time, i think i have to go cry into my notes and hope the water will help the information sink into my brain as i sleep on them tonight via osmosis  
  
You never told me what you dreamed about me.  
  
goodnight, keith  
  
Goodnight, Lance.  
  


Keith sighs and rests his phone down on his bare stomach. 

 

There is no way he is going to miss next class. He is truly so weak. 

 

* * *

 

It becomes a pattern; odd dreams about space and aliens and Lance, followed by texting Lance, who flirts shamelessly the later Keith texts. Instead of eyeing Keith like he’s trespassing and Lance is part of the neighborhood watch, Lance starts looking over to wiggle his eyebrows or whisper commentary about the level of craziness Keith, the professor, and every other student must have to sit and actually enjoy this class. Keith doesn’t tell Lance that he is basically the only reason Keith has continued to go, even though the professor has never brought up whether or not Keith belongs again. 

 

If it means he gets to look over and watch Lance try to balance a pencil on his fingertip while giving Keith a shit eating grin, Keith can’t say he’s too willing to look that particular gift horse in the mouth. 

 

Keith and Lance text nearly every day, and the dreams come every night, but it’s when Keith actually gets to see Lance in person that the dreams are their most vivid. Lance is always there, this otherworldly Lance who is just a little too cocky to really mean it and flies beside Keith in a giant robot cat as they fight evil. The feelings swallow Keith up every night, rip him open with some need to speak, touch, or do anything to bridge some silent gap that dream Keith can only seem despair at. 

 

When he wakes up, the desperation for conversation and companionship clings to him, and he always finds himself texting his Lance. That’s how he thinks of him, eventually. His Lance and dream Lance, just as he thinks of his dreamself as someone else and the same. Maybe he should be worried about losing his mind a little, or maybe he already has. 

 

Lance never brings up what kind of dreams he has about Keith, if he still has them, and Keith can’t bring himself to ask just yet, too nervous of what a person like his Lance, who does not seem to be very open-minded to things like multiverse theories, would think about it all. 

 

The professor assigns the first big essay of the year about three weeks in. 

 

The dream the night before had been brutal, like he had been made of loneliness. His skin is still itching a little, and every fidget Lance cannot seem to control has Keith on edge. 

 

“If you’ve been paying attention, this shouldn’t be hard for you,” the professor says, mustache trembling disapprovingly in Keith and Lance’s direction.  Lance sends Keith a look that has Keith already opening his mouth defensively, but a roll of Lance’s eyes stops him. 

 

_ He’s making fun of the professor, not me _ , thinks Keith, and that ball of tension he carries around like a medal in his dreams loosens its hold on him now, It worries him, how he brings parts of his dream self into this place, parts that feel too big to really belong here. That Keith shoulders responsibility and destruction all while knowing the stars could swallow him without anyone noticing. Keith, here, smiles gently in Lance’s direction, and Lance returns it with something smaller but prettier than anything Keith has seen, more so than any galaxy or alien world.

 

When class ends, Lance walks across the divide. “So, you’re coming over to my dorm to help me write this, right?”

 

Keith taps his chin in thought. “I feel like that would be cheating.”

 

Lance shoots an apprehensive look towards the other students, all gathered around the professor asking questions and discussing today’s lecture. He speaks lower, and Keith leans in a little to hear him better. “You’re not even enrolled here. This won’t hurt your GPA.”

 

“Maybe,” Keith admits. “Still, I know this school has an honor code.”

 

With a pout, Lance clasps his hands together. “Please help me? We both know I’m only in this class for you, anyways.” 

 

Keith knows it’s Lance playing dirty, because Lance knows Keith is weak for Lance’s attempts at flirting. With good reason, because Keith genuinely can’t help it. Lance’s blue eyes have gone all wide and circular, and his mouth looks soft when he pouts dramatically. Keith sighs and holds up a finger. “Fine, on one condition.”

 

“What is that?” Lance asks already knowing he’s won. A smug look settles onto his face. 

 

Keith grins as he leans in and whispers into Lance’s ear. Lance does not smell like alien soap here, but he does smell vaguely of citrus, with the added bonus of laundry detergent. “You let me bring you dinner.” 

 

Lance pulls back a little to give Keith an incredulous look. “On what planet would I say no to that? I’m a college student. We’re always down for free food.”

 

The urge to smile has the corner of Keith’s mouth quirks up, but he keeps control of his face as he says, “Great. It’s a date then.”

 

As he expected, Lance balks at him. “Oh.”

 

“I’ll text you the details?” Keith asks. Lance, it seems, can only nod. Keith gives him wave as he walks out the door. “Bye, Lance.”

 

* * *

 

Lance may always be in the dreams, but there is a whole cast beyond him. He meets the others slowly, though. There is Pidge and Hunk, Coran and Allura, a bunch of purple aliens in masks with names his dreamself never really says out loud but just knows; all of these people are important or mean the world to him, but his absolute favorite are the dreams where Shiro is present. 

 

Shiro dreams are always warm and filled with the kind of support Keith had always been so desperate for as a kid. Keith doesn’t know what kind of childhood his dreamself had, but he suspects he is just as needy for that feeling of family in his dreams, because he can feel it. It’s in his bones, this deep sort of affection he carries around for Shiro. Most of the time it also carries over, warming him from head to toe in the awful moments when he wakes, right there next to the fever heat of his skin and pounding head. 

 

Tonight it’s a Shiro dream. His relationship with the other members of the team has been smoothing over slowly, but he still rises to Lance’s bait as easy as anything. After yet another pitiful argument over nothing that leaves Keith aching, Shiro’s hand clasps his shoulder. They both watch in silence as Lance, Pidge, and Hunk fool around in the training room together, shoving each other and laughing.

 

“It’ll get easier, you know,” Shiro says quiet enough that only Keith can hear, and Keith’s heart hurts for so many reasons. A part of him wants to walk over to them and insert himself, even if he is not wanted, but the bickering has left a bad taste in his mouth. “I know you can’t see it, but you and Lance might have a lot more in common than you might think.”

 

“I really hope that’s not true,” Keith snaps automatically, arms still crossed. He shoots Shiro a cursory look to gauge his reaction before adding, apologetically, “He just, really gets to me, I guess. I don’t even know why. He’s not that bad.”

 

Shiro just gives him a soft smile and squeezes his shoulder. Keith’s afraid for a second that he knows what Keith really thinks of Lance, just with how understanding and forgiving the expression is. His chest swells with anxiety, but Shiro lets go, looking back to where the three of their teammates whose teasing has turned to quiet conversations and soft smiles. 

 

Keith doesn’t know what to do with this split feeling inside him. Lance throws his head back and laughs at something Hunk says, and everything becomes so much worse. Loving someone must be the worst feeling in the world if liking them feels this bad. 

 

“You need to find them, Keith,” Shiro says suddenly. Keith’s whole body locks up, and he can tell, immediately, this is not right. Each dream seems to have a script, and this is not part of tonight’s. Shiro’s tone sends chills down his spine, and Keith turns only to find an older Shiro standing there, hair gone completely white. “You have to find the team and wake up.”

 

Keith tries to open his mouth and speak, but he can’t. He’s staring at this Shiro, who looks haggard and upset, so serious that Keith can’t really process. Surely Shiro knows by now that he can’t stop or control the dreams. They are just along for the ride.

 

“Keith, I know you can do it. Find them,” Shiro repeats. 

 

Somehow, even though he knows it doesn’t fit here, Keith thinks of his Lance: his shaking shoulders as he tries to quietly laugh in class when Keith says something funny, long dark fingers wrapping around pens and tapping them quietly in class so as not to disturb other students, the way Lance catches him staring sometimes and pinkens all over like a sunset. 

 

“It’s not real,” Shiro tells him, like he can see all of these things too. His hand is on Keith’s arm again, gripped around his forearm. Shiro squeezes too tight, but Keith is still frozen. “Don’t let them draw you in. None of it is real, Keith. You have to find and help the team. They’re  _ your _ team.”

 

The words hit Keith like a blaster shot, and the room around them grows hazy. His eyes are closing. He panics, unsure of how to cling onto this, how to tell Shiro what’s happening, if it is Shiro. Everything around him is so silent, and the world goes completely black.

 

Keith jerks awake on his bed, rolling over immediately to dry heave. He forces air into his lungs, and his body is shaking once again. Every inch of him hurts, worst of all his head, but he forces his eyes open to look at his arm where Shiro had grabbed him.

 

The bruise isn’t formed yet, still just an ugly, angry red. He swallows the spit in his dry mouth, and nearly gags again. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to math class, i cannot seem to edit without adding words. this fic might end up.... a little longer than i planned. anyways, thank you for the incredible comments, i cry every time!! hope this one is also a banger for y'all

Keith showers and goes to work. It’s the same route Keith takes nearly every day, with nothing new to distract him from Shiro’s words swirling around in his brain on an endless loop. The sky above him seems to echo his ominous thoughts with dark clouds hanging on the horizon, but luckily enough, Keith gets to work before it opens up above him. 

 

In fact, Keith can’t think of a single time it has rained while he has been on his bike. There has been rain, and Keith’s only transportation is his motorbike, given to him by his last foster family as a “we consider you family” gift, but he has never been rained on. 

 

Ugly suspicion grows more and more as the day goes on, then as one day turns to two. His coworkers are all different from yesterday, and Keith nods and waves, not recognizing a single face. There are no obvious differences. He can’t even remember what they supposedly looked like yesterday, but he can’t shake the sense that something has changed.

 

Suspicion turns to knowing when Keith comes home, to his apartment he feels like he has lived in for months, and suddenly cannot even remember where he works. The way to get there, sure. He could go back now if he wants to, but the name is gone. Keith can’t even remember any street names. 

 

Keith panics and tries to come up with anything. Does he remember the name of the university Lance goes to, or even their professor’s name? Any friends he can think of off the top of his head? Families who have fostered him, past high schools, past pets?

 

Not a single name pops into his mind doesn’t belong to the people from his dreams. 

 

Keith remembers a father that he mourns there. A sad half-smile and tight, warm grip on his shoulder that carried him through rough days of school-yard fighting. A mother he doesn’t really know but thinks he can feel sometimes, while floating in the black of space. There’s more, so much more, there in his dreams. 

 

What about Lance then? Lance stands in a spotlight, right in the center of Keith’s mind. Every detail of his face, the sharp point of his chin and curve of his nose, is burned into Keith’s memory. Could Lance be fake here? Is the real Lance somewhere else?

 

Where exactly is he, anyways? Keith watches the world around him, collecting data, such as the way the weather can’t decide between humid hot or the dry kind of heat that settles into the very core of him. There are deserts in his dreams, the ones from very long ago before all the space and the Lions. Keith wears his jacket outside through all the weather changes, and it never feels like too much.

 

Keith keeps track of the smaller details, the way his coworkers change in faces and names, even when he can’t remember them. The color of his bedsheets change without him doing laundry. His bike sometimes feels bigger, sometimes smaller. Keith thinks he wears the same clothes, every day.

 

Lance, well. Keith can’t bring himself to call Lance or text him. He stops going to class and starts just riding around town. Keith can’t seem to find anything, anywhere that isn’t his job, at some unknown place, his apartment with no name, and the university, that has an endless row of buildings before becoming nothing but trees. Trees that disappear when Keith gets sick of looking at them.

 

It’s a lot to take in, without the added weight of not knowing whether or not Lance is some figment of his memories that he has carried into the desolate, ever-changing place, a landscape of sandcastles. A loneliness Keith had thought was isolated to space fills him. 

 

The texts don’t stop, though, even when Keith stops responding. Lance, it seems, just won’t give up. Keith may have managed to keep himself from replying so far, but he reads each and every one. 

 

He starts dreaming that Shiro is gone, in some part of the galaxy Keith hasn't discovered yet no matter his searching. Grief is a constant companion, even when everything changes: his Lion, the way his team reacts to him, his growing friendship with Lance. Of course Lance is there, for nearly every second, and it’s so different. Keith says something, and Lance laughs before responding. The gap is smaller between them, and even in the wake of his mourning, it lines his days in silver. 

 

Lance is talking to him as the dream takes focus. They’re walking in the Castle towards the training deck to meet up with Hunk, Pidge, and Allura. He throws an arm over Keith’s shoulders casually, as if they do this all the time. “Keith, buddy. I’m telling you this as a friend-”

 

“I don’t like where this is going already,” Keith states. 

 

“Hey!” Lance leans back and gives Keith his best angelic look of hurt. “I resent that. I’m a great friend.”

 

Keith’s pulse ticks up a little. “Are we? Friends now?”

 

Lance seems genuinely surprised by the question. “Of course we’re friends. Our rivalry has fizzled out into a beautiful friendship, filled with trust and acceptance. I don’t even comment on the mullet anymore.”

 

“You just did,” Keith points out. 

 

Lance shrugs and waves him off. “Semantics. My point, Keithy, is when was the last time we fought?”

 

“That is… Actually not a bad point,” Keith admits. Lance’s arm is warm where it rests against the back of his neck, over his shoulders. The lights in the hallways are so bright, there’s no way Lance will miss the way Keith has started to blush a little. “Okay, then. Friends.”

 

“Friends,” Lance agrees. “And as your friend-”

 

Keith wakes up aching. There’s a hole inside him, and his hands are holding his phone before he can even think it through.

okay, so you said you'd text me details, but i still haven't heard anything so this is me, texting you  
  
keith?  
  
so the essay was due today, and i want you to know you didn't actually have to help me with it. i'm just worried about you. it's been a couple days.  
  
keith, you haven’t been to class. i can't believe you're abandoning me to the rest of the crazies.  
  
not that you’re crazy!  
  
well, maybe a little bit, but i like your crazy.  
  
keith  
  
please  
  
i really miss you  
  
sorry! ignore that, i just had some weird dreams last night  
  


 

Keith wants Lance to be real, wants all of this to be real. He wants Lance, the fidgeting, the posturing, the possible piloting of alien spacecrafts in a war in space. Even if this Lance isn’t real, he is the realest thing here. 

 

Lance, I'm so sorry. Can I come over? I need to talk to you about something.  
  


 

It takes Lance a couple of minutes to answer. Keith watches the small writing bubble pop up and disappear a couple of times. He holds his breath when Lance finally responds.

 

of course. right now?  
  
I'll be there in a minute.  
  


 

Keith doesn’t take anything in while heading towards Lance’s dorm, too focused on what he plans to say. Trepidation is heavy on his shoulders, sinking into his gut. 

 

In his dreams, wrapped in metal corridors and controlled environmental settings, there is a soft brightness. Out here, even speeding down a road without speed limit signs, in the bright sunshine that doesn’t seem to reach him, Keith feels as if everything is just a shade too dull. The ride to the university seems to take forever and only half a second at the same time. Lance never texted him directions; Keith doesn’t know how he finds Lance’s building or dorm, but he does. Knows even less how he gets in, but the walk up the stairs is quick, too quick.

 

Keith stands outside for a second, trying to think of all the reasons not to knock. He does the inevitable and gives in.

 

When Lance opens his dorm door, Keith just takes a moment to stare at him. All of the stupid doubt that had been clouding his mind for days just flies away. Lance lights up the entire hallway, changes every detail from dullness into sharp focus. Keith’s lungs expand, and he stands there, just breathing. 

 

“You okay?” Lance’s eyebrows are furrowed in concern as he asks, reaching out slowly as if Keith will startle away from his grasp. His soft hand wraps around one of Keith’s, and Keith knows just how real all of it is that he can barely stand it. “Keith, you’re freaking me out, dude.”

 

“Lance, what are the names of your friends?” Keith asks, breathless. Demands, more like, but he has to make Lance understand, has to make sure that what he feels is more than just a hunch.   
  


Lance snorts, back to staring at Keith like he really is crazy. “What? Why?” There’s a twist to his mouth that spells out Lance’s irritation. 

 

“You have friends, right? What are their names?” Keith wants to return Lance’s loosening grip on his fingers, but he can’t. Not until he knows, because if this place is fake, but Lance is real like him, then Lance is… Someone else in the real world. Not the guy who flirts with Keith in class and texts Keith that he’s missed.  

 

Lance is still looking at him as if he’s insane. “Of course I have friends. Too many, actually. I feel like I never get a second to myself-”

 

“Names, Lance, what are they?” Keith reiterates. Lance’s face is screwed up in confusion, and he keeps opening his mouth as if to answer but doesn’t. There’s a wildness in Lance’s eyes that Keith can imagine matching his own. “What about this school? What is it called?”

 

Lance is, again, at a loss for an answer. His voice is hoarse as he speaks. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

 

“Lance,” Keith says slowly, every inch of him steadying. “I think this isn’t real. I think something’s happened to us.”

 

“What-” Lance still can’t find words, and his hand has left Keith’s entirely to run through his short hair. Keith mourns the fact he never will get to touch it, not if Lance is the person in his dreams. 

 

It pours out of Keith then, the mixture of relief and wanting forcing the confession. “I’ve been having dreams about you every night, except they’re not just about you. They’re about space, and these robots, and people I’ve never met before but I love them.”  _ I love you _ , Keith wants to add, but he hasn’t told him in the real world for a reason, and he can’t bring himself to say it here either, not now that he knows there is somewhere else for them. 

 

Lance’s eyes are wide again, and to Keith’s already substantial horror, they fill with tears. “You mean the team right? Hunk, Pidge. Allura and Coran, oh God.”

 

“Shiro,” Keith finishes for him, can barely bring himself to whisper, and while it may be the first time he’s said it out loud here, it comes from him like a favorite prayer. Takashi Shirogane, Keith’s patience when he has run out, and his saving grace when that does not work. His _brother_. 

 

Lance and Keith stare at each other for a moment, sizing each other up. The tears in Lance’s eyes have either fallen or receded for now, and Keith finds himself grateful. He’s never been good with comforting others. 

 

Lance stands to the side and waves him in. “I think we should talk.”

 

Keith nods and enters, ignoring the grey, lifeless walls. There are no knickknacks, no clutter. There is a neatly folded pile of clothes and stacks of notebooks on a tidy desk against a wall. Lance in his dreams is a loud, vibrant person, who has an appreciation for pretty things and pushes sentiment onto everything. Keith knows these blank walls and surfaces are wrong. He sits on the tightly made bed, the only thing that makes any sort of sense in the wake of knowing.

 

Lance sits next to him, and they turn to face each other. Lance looks stricken, awfully pale and drawn. “The dreams… I have them too. You’re in them sometimes. It’s you, but not this you, you know?” Lance laughs awkwardly. “That doesn’t even make sense.”

 

“None of this makes sense. Think about the weather here. Just last week, it was sweltering. Humid and hot-” 

 

“It reminds me of where I’m from, I think. Near the ocean, so it’s always humid,” Lance blurts. He fiddles with the seam of his jeans, not meeting Keith’s eyes anymore. “I dream about a family that isn’t mine, but is, you know? They’re all older and cool, but they think the world of me.” 

 

“I don’t have a family, not in the normal sense. Not there either, but I have Shiro. Shiro’s my brother,” Keith tells him in a rush. His hands rest on his knees, fingers digging in. “I don’t think by blood, but he is in every way that counts. I always wanted a brother here.”

 

Lance’s mouth quirks into a small, sad smile. “I dream about Hunk and Pidge nearly every night.” 

 

Keith doesn’t know what to say to that. The dreams have always been focused on Lance for Keith, but he knows the team is the closest thing he has ever had to a typical family. The silence sits heavy between them, but Lance doesn’t seem to be in any rush to fill it either, even if his tan fingers have started tapping on his jeans. 

 

“So is that why you fell off the face of the earth? If this even is Earth,” Lance jokes, eyes darting to meet Keith’s then moving away. The smile falls off his face. “Probably a little too soon to make jokes about that.”

 

Keith tries for a half-smile that Lance can’t seem to look at Keith long enough to see. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know if you were real or not, and if you weren’t… I’m not sure what I would have done if you weren’t real, Lance.”

 

Whatever is in Keith’s tone makes Lance finally look at him. His eyes are so blue, wide and staring into Keith. “How do you know I’m real now?”

 

Keith shrugs, unable to stop the bitter smile. “You are the realest thing in this entire world for me.”

 

Lance’s breath comes out in a rush. His eyes seem to take in every detail of Keith’s face, and he leans in, just the slightest bit. Keith’s heart rate doubles. “Keith,” Lance says, barely over a whisper. It draws Keith in like a magnet. “Is this real?”

 

Keith splits open. “Lance, please don’t ask me that.” He swallows. “I don’t think you like me there.”

 

Keith watches Lance’s expression change, shutter down into something like guilt. He moves out of Keith’s space, taking Keith’s breath with him. Lance's gaze falls to where he’s started to pick at his jeans once more. “I don’t dislike you. You’re just like, your own universe there. You don’t need anything from anybody. I envy that.”

 

“That’s not true,” Keith argues. “I constantly need you guys. You keep me from going off and trying to blow up all the aliens alone.”

 

Lance’s mouth quirks up into something bitter and thin. “You probably could, honestly. I constantly want people to think I’m good at everything, but you just are. It’s frustrating.”

 

“You are good at things,” Keith says. “You’re good at a lot of things.” 

 

“Did you know here I’m top of all my classes?” Lance asks, sneaking a look at Keith, as if Keith hasn’t been staring at him this entire time. “I’m on track and captain of the swim team. Every time I leave my dorm, at least like twenty people say hi, even if I don’t ever remember their names.” 

 

“That’s a lot of people,” Keith says, trying not to sound as horrified at the concept as he feels. He doesn’t succeed because Lance sends him another small but more genuine smile.

 

“It’s kind of nice, but it wasn’t until I met you that anyone actually mattered, I guess,” Lance says, his cheeks pinkening. His hands have stilled completely when he finally meets Keith’s gaze head on. “I feel like I can’t stop thinking about you, honestly.” 

 

Keith, to his embarrassment, feels his own face turning a matching shade of pink. “I can’t stop thinking about you either.” Lance has leaned in close again, and Keith wants to badly to just give in, to just kiss him already. 

 

Lance watches his hesitation before sighing. He moves away again, this time moving to lean on his hands behind him. Keith hates the way Lance’s tee shirt draws tight over his chest with the motion and forces himself to look away altogether. 

 

“I always thought you were straight,” Keith admits, after an awkward pause. “In the dreams, I mean.”

 

Lance snorts, using one hand to rub his face. “I am definitely not straight. Whatever I feel for you here or there, I am definitely not straight,” he says through his fingers. His eyes meet Keith’s.

 

Keith’s heart is still beating so quickly, his palms burning into the thighs of his jeans. “Okay,” Keith answers, fighting a smile. “Me neither.”

 

A laugh bubbles out of Lance, and he looks at Keith again, finally. “I could have guessed.”

 

“Even there?” Keith asks. 

 

“You’re different there,” Lance says, looking away again. There’s something in the way he says it that makes Keith feel fragile. “So separate, but you care. We all know you care.”

 

Keith doesn’t know what to say to that. A separate sort of universe sounds so lonely to him, and for what? 

 

“Listen, it’s getting late. Do you want to sleep with me?” Lance stiffens as his words sink in for both of them, face going three shades darker as he follows it up with a hurried, “I mean like, sleep here with me tonight. I don’t know if I want to be alone now that I know that everyone here is like, fake or something.”

 

Keith’s brain takes a second to reboot. “Um, yeah. I would like that.”

 

“Cool.” Lance jumps up awkwardly and walks to the closet, pulling out a couple of blankets. He lies them down on the ground and plops down, crossing his legs. “I’ll just sleep down here.”

 

Keith frowns, looking down at where Lance’s has placed his blankets. “You don’t have to sleep on the floor. It’s your room.”

 

“No, it’s not.” Lance looks around the grey, sad space. “I hate this room, I think.” 

 

He lies down slowly, facing Keith. Keith copies him, over the covers of Lance’s bed. It smells like citrus and laundry detergent. The space between the floor and the bed feels like a canyon. “It’s not that late, you know. We can keep talking, if you want.”

 

For a moment, they just continue to stare at each other. “Meeting you here was like a revelation. Why wasn’t it like that where we’re from?” Lance points an accusatory finger at Keith. “That’s mostly rhetorical, so don’t answer.”

 

Keith ignores the sharp ache in his chest, rolling his eyes and asking, “Where do you think we are?” 

 

“I don’t know. Prison?” Lance sighs. “I wish I didn’t have to get up to turn the lights off.”

 

They are both still staring at each other when the lights flick off by themselves. Keith watches Lance’s eyes go wide and terrified. 

 

“Okay, maybe I will sleep on the bed,” Lance says, voice tight. He pushes himself up and climbs over Keith to take the side up against the wall. Keith lets out a gust of air when Lance’s knee unintentionally finds his stomach. 

 

“Watch it,” Keith mumbles, rubbing his stomach and turning to face Lance. 

 

“You don’t think this place is haunted, right?” Lance asks, looking around the now dark room with still wide eyes.

 

Keith bites his lip, trying not to laugh. “Honestly, I think it’s just part of wherever we are. I found your dorm room, didn’t I? Even though I’ve never been here before.”

 

“I didn’t even think about that,” Lance admits. He sighs. “Okay, well, I’m still sleeping up here, so you better not hog all the covers.”

 

“I don’t. If anyone would be a blanket hog, it’d be you,” Keith teases. He doesn’t mention that they are both over the covers anyways. Somehow, getting under the covers feels too intimate, like lying in Lance’s bed with Lance looking at him in this dark room isn’t intimate enough already. 

 

Lance places a hand over his heart. “You wound me with these false accusations. Lies and deceit. Dragging my name through the mud.”

 

“You’re so dramatic,” Keith says with a roll of his eyes.

 

“I’m dramatic? Me? You’re the one who looks like a love interest out of a young adult novel, with your quiet brooding and leather. Not to mention the bike,” Lance tells him.

 

“What’s wrong with my bike?” Keith asks, curiously.

 

“Nothing’s wrong with it. It’s perfect for you,” Lance says with a wave of his hand. 

 

Keith doesn’t know how to interpret that. “Somehow that feels like an insult.” 

 

“Maybe so, but it’s also not wrong,” Lance states baldly. “Now stop keeping me up. I do have class tomorrow.”

 

Keith opens his mouth to argue when something occurs to him. “What do you think will happen if we just don’t do any of the things we’re supposed to do?”

 

Lance’s mouth does a complicated twist. “What do you mean?”

 

Keith sits up, ignoring just how dark the room is now. He finds Lance’s eyes. “What if we don’t go to work or classes?”

 

Lance bites his lower lip, and Keith thinks it’s entirely unfair that he can look so distressed and so beautiful all at once. “I guess we’re going to find out, aren’t we?”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love Intense Emotions and tension. not even sorry.

It’s Lance again, this time standing in Keith’s room and looking at him. He talks about there being six Paladins and five Lions, what it all means, and Keith knows Lance needs something from him. Keith can feel the words he says as reassurance aren’t fitting, even as they leave his mouth, but what he really wants to say is too much. It doesn’t sit right here, in this lopsided friendship they have built. 

 

Lance gives him a sad smile as he leaves, and Keith wants it to be enough. 

 

When Keith wakes up slowly, he’s pressed up against someone. Warm, and soft citrus floods him. Keith licks his dry lips and rubs an eye open, turning over to face Lance, who is also waking. Lance cracks open one bloodshot blue eye and levels it at Keith. 

 

“Hi,” Keith croaks, reaching out thoughtlessly. He touches Lance’s face, the imprints of the pillow on his cheek all the way to his sharp chin. Somehow his fingers find their way to the cropped hair at Lance’s temple, rubbing over the soft short strands. 

 

“Hi,” Lance says after a moment, wide eyes and a twist to his mouth. “What are you doing?”

 

Keith stops and his sleep-addled brain clicks back online. His body locks up as he just takes a moment to pray that the bed will swallow him. 

 

“Hey, no,” Lance says, propping himself up and grabbing Keith’s now lax hand. He holds it against his chest, where Keith can feel his heart beating steady. “It’s okay, don’t freak out. This is probably the best I’ve woken up the entire time we’ve been here.” 

 

“Me too,” Keith says, voice still sleep-heavy. “There’s been a lot of night sweats.”

 

Lance makes a face as he flops back on the bed. His fingers have started stroking over Keith’s knuckles. Keith can’t tell if Lance is doing it on purpose or not. “You’re telling me. I always feel like my stomach is trying to exit my body.”

 

“I’ve had some of that too,” Keith agrees. He watches Lance fiddle with his fingers for a moment, the way he fiddled with his pens in class, before taking a deep breath and holding it as he threads their fingers together. He keeps his knuckles pressed against Lance’s chest. 

 

Lance turns to face him again, cheeks pink. Keith tightens his grip on Lance’s hand. “How can you be so different there?” 

 

“What do you mean?” Keith asks. Lance’s thumb has started running over Keith’s.

 

“You just-” Lance stops himself, looking contemplative. “You didn’t even remember me from the Garrison, you know? You left this huge hole I felt like I was expected to fill. No matter what I did, I was just… Always not good enough. And then we were out there, in the Castle with the Lions, I took it with me. It was like l was obsessed with you, with trying to match up with you, and I think even half of the time that we were fighting together, unless we were fighting, you didn’t even see me.”

 

“Lance,” Keith starts but has to stop, to breathe. He tries to find the words, tightening his grip on Lance’s loosening hand as he thinks. “You have never had to compare yourself to me. We are very different people.”

 

“That doesn’t actually make me feel better,” Lance says with an annoyed frown. 

 

Keith holds up a hand as he says, “Hold on, I’m not finished. You called me my own universe yesterday, right? But you’re not a universe, you’re more like… A sun. You’re the center of it all, of me, of Pidge and Hunk and Shiro and Allura. We all gravitate towards you. We all need you, to support us or call us out.”

 

Lance’s cheeks are pink again.  He props himself on his elbow and holds his free hand out, an exasperated look crossing his face. “See, this? This is what I mean. You would never say any of this there. Instead you’re like, dead set on doing your own thing all the time.”

 

Keith sighs, propping himself up to match. “I can’t… This isn’t real, you know? You would never let me do this there.” Keith squeezes Lance’s hand. “Those people, they’re us, but they’re also not.”

 

Lance sighs sadly, and it breaks a bit of Keith’s heart. “Do you think it could have been like this there? If I hadn’t been as obsessed with trying to… Prove myself, or something?”

 

“I don’t handle emotions very well, from what I’ve seen. Especially where you’re concerned,” Keith says, trying to sound blase. He tries not to look at Lance as he speaks, but he can’t help himself. 

 

Lance’s eyes find his. It feels like time is a fragile piece of spun glass stretched out between them, a small bridge to cross the gap that haunts Keith’s dreams. “What do you mean, where I’m concerned?” Lance asks, quiet, even in the small space.

 

“You get to me,” Keith confesses, trying explain the jumble of emotions that swallow him while he sleeps. He can feel his palm starting to sweat. “You see my faults, and you don’t have a problem with pointing them out. When I became the Black Paladin, it helped a lot, having you. You’ve never had to prove yourself to me, because you just are. You’re obnoxious and loud, but also so fucking smart, aware, and brave.”

 

“I think some part of me knows, but I get back into the dreams, and I’m just so desperate. Desperate to be good for the team, for the universe. Good for you,” Lance says in a rush. He rolls his eyes and sighs. Keith can feel it more than hear it. “I mean, a good second for you. You need someone who can give you advice, and with Shiro gone-”

 

“You did a great job. Do a great job. I don’t know, I haven’t seen that far,” Keith admits. When he thinks about it, there is a definitely timeline to the dreams. “Do you think we remember things from the same time periods?”

 

Lance blows out a rush of air as he flops onto his back. He tugs Keith’s arm a little as he does so, but he didn’t say anything about Keith’s sweaty palms, so Keith just lets it happen. “I don’t know, maybe. Why?”

 

“What did you dream about last night?” Keith asks instead of answering. 

 

Lance’s cheeks darken. “I don’t know if I want to tell you.” 

 

“Now you definitely have to tell me,” Keith says, leaning forwards. “Come on, I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

 

Lance rolls his head to give him a dirty look. “You know, your flirting has consequences now.”

 

“Why is that?” Keith asks. He already knows, but he just wants to hold onto this feeling of being able to say these things.  

 

“Do you think you’re going to hate this when we get back?” Lance asks, sounding sad again. Keith watches the Lance’s eyes dart over every inch of Keith’s face, and warmth blooms in him, right next to the anxiety.

 

“I’m afraid that you will,” Keith states honestly.

 

“We don’t even know how to get back,” Keith responds, leaning back against the pillows. He’s still cradling Lance’s hand in his, woven together and lying on the bed now. “Maybe we can’t.”

 

“How did you even figure out this all was fake?” Lance asks, eyes still moving over Keith’s face. The attention has Keith’s pulse kicking up, but he doesn’t allow himself to outwardly react. Lance’s other hand moves very slowly, as if he wants to brush his fingertips over Keith’s cheek. Lance stops barely an inch away, and Keith has to close his eyes. “I wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t met you. If I’d decided to drop that class, or whatever. You’re just. You’re so real. You put the rest of this world to shame.”

Keith’s eyes open at that. He really cannot help himself where this idiot is concerned. “Lance,” he says, voice pitched low. Lance’s eyes shift from his mouth to meet Keith’s gaze once more, pupils blown. Keith takes another deep breath and steadies himself. “I had a dream where Shiro was telling me everyone was in trouble. That we have to find the team, somewhere out there.”

 

Lance frowns, his other hand falling onto Keith’s shoulder. “Where do you think they are?” 

 

With a shrug, Keith thinks. It’s a little difficult as Lance has started fidgeting with Keith’s fingers again. “I’ve been driving around a lot, and there really isn’t a lot here. Like no grocery stores or gas stations. Nothing. There’s my apartment, and the place that I’ve been ‘working’, or whatever.”

 

Lance bites his lip as he thinks. “So they’re also on campus? I’ve gone to a couple of classes, but it always feels like there are millions of them, all happening at once. Like if I take the wrong door, I’ll walk into somewhere else entirely, a different school or something.”  

 

“We should start there,” Keith says with finality. He begrudgingly frees Lance’s hand to push himself up into a sitting position.

 

Lance looks down at Keith’s chest and then back up quickly, turning away. “When did you take your shirt off?”

 

Keith looks down. “Oh. I always sleep without it. I guess it just kind of, disappeared?” 

 

“Like with the lights last night,” Lance says. His eyes are back on Keith’s chest, and the fingertips of his now free hand land somewhere near in the middle of Keith’s ribcage. Keith’s heart trips over itself underneath where Lance’s fingers graze his sternum. When Lance spreads his hand wide, palm catching every quickened beat, he meets Keith’s eyes. Keith has to focus on taking in air. “You are very distracting.”

 

“You’re telling me,” Keith manages. His fingers itch to touch Lance, to cup his cheek and press their foreheads together to prove this is real. “Are you? Going to hate this later, I mean.”

 

Lance shrugs with one shoulder. His tee shirt looks soft, the sort of blue that brings out the heaviness in Lance’s eyes. “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t. Real me seems like kind of a mess.”

 

“I like the real you,” Keith says immediately. Lance flinches and begins to pull his hand away. Keith catches it and presses it back. “I like this you too, though. I think I just… Like you.”

 

“Oh,” Lance breathes. When he smiles, it’s blinding. “I think I like you too.”

 

“Oh,” Keith echoes. He’s drawn into Lance’s space, moving in further when he sees Lance doing the same. He wants to memorize this: the sleepy mess of Lance’s hair, impressions from the pillow still on his cheek, how Lance’s eyes have gone half-lidded as his soft hand slides further down Keith’s chest. It feels like a dream, like something Keith would never want to wake up from. It hits him then. “Lance, stop, hold on.”

 

Lance’s fingers have started to trace Keith’s collarbones, and it’s almost enough to derail Keith’s train of thought completely. When Lance stops, Keith has to take a deep breath before continuing. “What if this is a dream?”

 

The expression on Lance’s face reaffirms it for him. “It would make sense. But how?”

 

“I don’t know, but I think we need to go look for the others as fast as possible.” Keith stays still as Lance searches his face for something. Keith finds himself faltering. “Lance-”

 

“When we find them, what happens then?” Lance asks. Keith is laid out bare as Lance watches his face.

 

“We figure it out,” Keith says. It doesn’t feel like enough, and Lance’s faltering expression echoes the expression Keith had seen in his dream. “I don’t know, Lance. We don’t even know if we can… Wake up, or whatever, yet.”

 

“Okay,” Lance says, soft and low. Keith is so tired of aching, but the brutal feeling of loss that resonates through his chest as Lance moves away is so much worse. “I’m kind of hungry. Can we at least get food before we go on a manhunt?”

 

“I think that’s a good idea.” Keith puts everything behind a brick wall, ignoring how easy it comes to him, and pushes himself off the bed. He can feel Lance’s eyes on his back as he walks to the closet. 

 

“If this is a dream, my clothes will be in your closet,” Keith states pointedly. He opens the door. His clothes are neatly draped on hangers inside.

 

“Fuck, that’s creepy,” Lance states from the bed. He stands, rolling all the way up onto the tips of his toes to stretch towards the ceiling. Keith admires the line of his body as it arches while he can still get away with it. Lance’s feet fall flat on the floor once more. He shoots Keith a wink. “See something you like?”

 

“Who’s using bad flirting now?” Keith shoots, refocusing on pulling his jeans up over his boxers. Lance watches as unabashedly, just as Keith had watched him. 

 

“Is it working?” Lance teases. He slips his tee shirt over his head, and Keith wants to snap at how not fair it is.

 

Keith stalks towards him, putting himself firmly into Lance’s space. He’s got maybe half an inch on Lance, despite how Keith always seems to be shorter in his dreams. Lance swallows audibly as they share air for a moment. Keith keeps his voice low and careful as he speaks. “Lance.” Lance leans in further, and Keith gives in, tracing the curve of Lance’s jaw, all the way down his throat. “You are making this very difficult for me.”

 

“I just don’t want to throw this away,” Lance admits, eyes fluttering closed as he leans his head back just enough that Keith can run his thumb over the hollow of Lance’s throat. Keith wants to follow his fingertips with his lips, to kiss Lance at his pulse point. He doesn’t. “This will change when we leave.”

 

Keith stops, thinking about how Lance looks at him in the dreams. There’s sometimes respect and admiration, appreciation, but there’s never this, Lance’s wide pupils swallowing up the blue in his eyes, his bitten lip. Lance makes the smallest sound of frustration. “You’re right, which is why we shouldn’t be doing any of this. We are only working with part of the information.” Keith steps backwards and lets Lance right himself. “Let’s go eat. I think we both need some air.”

 

“Who all do you think is here?” Lance asks, rubbing at his neck almost absentmindedly, right where Keith had just been touching him. Keith’s hand clenches, Lance’s warmth still clinging to him. 

 

“Shiro isn’t here, so Coran also is probably safe.” Keith grabs a shirt and pulls it on. “Even if the rest of the team is here at the university, we don’t know where.” 

 

Lance shrugs a new tee shirt on, and Keith has to look away when he drops his sleep pants. “This place is pretty big, but it’s not endless. We probably could find them today, once we figure out a system.”

 

Keith knows famous last words when he hears them.

 

* * *

 

The walk to the cafeteria is all Keith really needs to understand what Lance meant when he said everybody seems to know him. 

 

They are stopped at least four or five times by random groups of people, all vaguely familiar, asking Lance how he is doing. No one mentions that Lance isn’t in class, hasn’t been all day. Lance is all smiles, fist bumping one of guys and hugging the girl next to him. A small ghost of the separation Keith feels in the other world leaves a hollow place inside him as he watches Lance effortless interact with these strangers, even while knowing what he does.

 

It fades when Lance turns and gives him a wink. 

 

Eventually they make it all the way to the cafeteria. Even the people working behind the line wave and greet Lance by name, all staunchly ignoring Keith’s presence, as if they know he is not meant to be there. Lance grabs random food, piling it onto the plate. 

 

“One thing I will say, I am so glad to be eating real food again,” Lance tells him, stacking three pieces of pizza onto a corner of his trey. “No offense to Hunk. He is a master at food goo, but at the end of the day, goo is goo.”

 

Keith hums in agreement, eyeing the other patrons of the caf. No one is looking at them, until they get a little closer. At once, three or four heads turn in their direction. Lance doesn’t notice, but Keith keeps his attention on them until they reach the cash register.

 

The girl operating it gives Lance a large, slightly unsettling smile. “Hey, Lance, how’s it going?”

 

“Oh, you know, same old, same old,” Lance says with a wave of his hand. “Hey, so here’s the thing, I forgot my card and I can’t pay.”

 

The girl seems to think about it. “Okay, I can let it slide this once.” She turns towards Keith. 

 

Keith thinks of the clothes in the closet, of the lights last night. “I don’t have to pay,” he says, as if reminding her. 

 

She blinks, while Lance turns to balk at him. “Oh, yeah. You don’t. Have a good day!”

 

Keith nods and starts walking away, trying to figure out what it means. Lance speeds up his pace to catch him, grabbing Keith’s arm. “Hey,” Lance says, annoyed. “What was that? That was rude.”

 

“We don’t have to follow the rules, Lance,” Keith says harshly. “It’s all fake.”

 

“That’s no reason to be an asshole,” Lance argues back, letting go of Keith’s arm. “They may be fake people, but they’re still people. We don’t know whether or not they have feelings.” 

 

Keith looks away from Lance and notices a couple of people waving in their direction. A couple more in the cafeteria have turned their heads. “You’re like a beacon,” Keith grumbles when he sees them stand and head their way. 

 

“People like me here. I can’t help it,” Lance snaps back. 

 

“It’s because you want them to talk to you,” Keith tells him. His hands are clutching the trey tightly, and every inch of him feels wound up tight like a spring. “You want the attention, and so they give it to you.”

 

Lance jerks back as if Keith had hit him. “Just because I am actually capable of forming genuine human connections doesn’t mean I want to be the center of attention all the time.”

 

The people walking towards them have stopped. Keith motion towards them. “How about you go make your human connections over there, and I’ll sit over here, far away from it all?”

 

“That’s how it usually works anyways, right?” Lance snaps. “You, keeping yourself separate from all the pleasantly humans, out of all the icky emotions.”

 

“I was raised in a desert, Lance! There’s not a lot of opportunity for socializing out there,” Keith retorts. He turns and walks over to the closest empty table, slamming the trey down. Lance follows him, moving past the people standing awkwardly and looking at each other in confusion. 

 

“Don’t I know it,” Lance says. “You’re like one of those dogs who hears a creak in the house and loses its mind barking.”

 

“At least I’m aware of our situation right now. We don’t know what’s going to happen, or how to leave,” Keith grumbles, deflating as he takes his seat. Lance takes the seat opposite of him, his glare directed at Keith as he places his trey in front of himself. 

 

“You acting like a dick isn’t going to change anything, Keith,” Lance responds. He angrily shoves a piece of pizza in his mouth, taking a violent bite. “You know, honestly? I’m starting to doubt this is a dream at all. Maybe sometime between when we left my dorm and when we got here, we woke up, because you sure are acting like you do out there.”

 

Keith opens his mouth to argue before it really registers. “Oh,” Keith says. He stops tearing up the piece of bread he had blindly thrown onto his trey in line. 

 

Lance loses his steam too. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

 

“You’re right though,” Keith says. He stares at his still hands, still hovering above the shredded bread. 

 

“No, I’m not. You aren’t pointlessly angry. I’m just not used to setting you off here,” Lance admits. He stares sadly at his limp pizza, oozing on his fingers. 

 

“You didn’t set me off,” Keith tells him. “I’m just… Overwhelmed, I think. Being out here, talking to all these people. I worked a couple of times since the dream about Shiro, but it’s different now, knowing it’s all in our heads.”

 

Lance leans back in his seat, plopping his pizza back onto the trey. His leg bumps into Keith’s under the table, and he doesn’t move it away. “What was it you said earlier? We’ll figure it out. We’re a team. You’re not alone.”

 

“I know,” Keith says. “Maybe that’s part of the problem. What if we do something and you get hurt?”

 

“I get hurt all the time,” Lance says with a wave of his hand. “We both do. It comes with the territory.”

 

“I don’t feel used to this. I can’t imagine ever being used to it,” Keith tells him. Lance finally looks at him. 

 

“We are, somewhere. You trust me to have your back, and I trust you,” Lance reminds him. 

 

“I trust you here too,” Keith tells him honestly. 

 

Lance smiles. He reaches for the pudding on his trey and scoops a spoonful. “I trust you too. We’ve survived worse than a dream.”

 

Keith sighs. “Okay, we should come up with a game plan.” 

 

Mouthful of pudding, Lance grins. “Lucky for you, that is my specialty.”

 

They’ll be okay, Keith reminds himself as they talk. Lance laughs. They have to be.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS IS SO LONG i'd say i'm sorry, but i just..... .... couldn't break it up.

They end up starting with the dorm building.

 

“Everyone’s at classes right now,” Keith says as they jog up the stairs to the next floor. They have been searching rooms for only forty-five minutes, and Keith is starting to pick up the faults in this particular plan. “Why are we looking there?”

 

“You remember Pidge’s bunk.” Lance has figured out that if he just wills the doors to unlock, they will. The dorm door knob in Lance’s hand twists open with ease. “I’ll admit, I didn’t count on a bunch of people being just as disgusting.”

 

“Pidge has a system,” Keith says in half-assed defense. He opens the door to the room opposite of the one Lance has entered.

 

Lance snorts, but it’s muffled by the half-closed door. “That’s what she says, but I know for a fact it is not true. She lost everything when we were in the Garrison.”

 

“I’m sure that’s not entirely accurate,” Keith mutters under his breath. A tiny bubble of guilt rises in him. He can’t figure out why he would latch onto Lance in his memories, even if he does have some soul-crushing secret love for him. Days with the others float in, always blurred and blended, and slip away when he wakes in the morning.

 

They both silently check rooms for forms of identification, or just anything in particular that screams Pidge. “Just remember, it has to have a bunch of computer parts, gadgets, and dirty clothes to form a tiny nest for her to sleep in,” Lance reminds him from the a different room, some time later. They are almost finished with this floor.

 

Lance hums while they work, or will shout out random comments and awkward discoveries. “I think I found someone’s sex toy collection!” and “Do you think Pidge has started wearing a lot of bedazzled jeans?” Keith never seems to find anything interesting, and he

wonders how much of it is the dream, trying to keep Lance occupied.

 

They reach the end of the hallway before Lance caves. “You’re right, this isn’t working,” Lance admits, huffing and crossing his arms. “I thought I would just be able to know, I guess. Like I know Pidge so well, I would be able to feel it.”

 

_Kinda like I did with you_ , goes unspoken, and Keith can’t look at Lance, even if he feels Lance’s eyes on him.

 

“It’s a good idea for when there are actual people in them, I think. Think about your room. I would never have guessed that it belonged to you,” Keith says. He bites the inside of his cheek as he thinks. “I just don’t know what will happen if we break into a bunch of rooms with people actually in them.”

 

“Probably nothing, considering what happened in the cafeteria,” Lance says. He’s now staring at the door of the last room in the hall, the one he had checked only moments before. “Do you think they know they’re fake?”

 

Keith doesn’t know how to answer that. “What do you mean?”

 

“Like they probably have pasts, memories, and thoughts, right? They’re not just empty shells walking around,” Lance answers, slow and thoughtful. He looks vaguely sick as he continues, and the same feeling echoes through Keith. “They might be coming from us, and our thoughts, but do they have any self-awareness? It’s not like they are NPCs in a video game, right?”

 

The hallway takes on a darker, more abstract feel as Keith looks at all the doors to rooms of people in this dreamscape. Despite having opened each one, they seem to stretch on forever. Lance shivers next to him. Keith swallows before speaking. “I was going to suggest getting more food, but I don’t think I have much of an appetite anymore.”

 

Lance shakes his head. “Me neither. It looks like it’s a little late, anyways. We got through at least three floors, though. We should start with the academic buildings, I guess.”

 

The endless row of buildings that Keith would drive by filter in through his mind. “Maybe we should start tomorrow,” Keith says, suddenly exhausted. Lance turns to look at him, takes in the expression on his face.

 

“Tomorrow,” Lance agrees. Blue, Keith thinks, will be ruined for him after this, if it wasn’t before. “Do you want to go back to my room?”

 

Keith nods and lets Lance lead the way. He wonders if Lance also can feel the pieces of themselves they leave behind, the ones that Keith has had pounding on the prison of his ribcage all day. The urgency from a couple hours ago has faded into a residual burn, one that is almost overshadowed by the awareness of their eggshell lined space here.

 

Oddness settles between them, in the steps from Lance’s back to Keith’s chest, keeping them at lengths until they reach Lance’s room. Lance opens the door, not even bothering with the key he had used to lock it when they left earlier today. He holds the door for Keith, and Keith’s heart starts beating faster as he crosses the threshold.

 

While the room had been uncomfortable yesterday, now it seems almost safe in comparison to the rest of this building, campus, _place_. Keith takes a deep breath and turns to face Lance, who is already watching him as the door slides closed behind Lance’s back. The click of the door seals them into their protective bubble.

 

Lance walks to where Keith is standing and watching him, gazing back, head tilted upwards. His soft, cool fingers brush Keith’s sides, curl under the end of his shirt, moving it up. Keith doesn’t look away from Lance’s devastatingly open face, not even when Lance lifts his shirt over Keith’s head.

 

Keith lets him, stands in front of Lance, shirtless, and watches Lance’s mouth move as takes Keith in. Lance bites his lower lip, his hands coming back up to touch, but Keith grabs Lance’s wrist gently. “You, too,” Keith says, voice rough.

 

Lance nods, tugging his shirt over his head with little finesse or fanfare. It finds them in a position eerily familiar to that morning. The determination on Lance’s face is different, but the softness of his fingers is not, not as they splay over Keith’s ribs and lower. Keith returns his grip to Lance’s wrist, to stop Lance whenever he wants, but he doesn’t.  

 

With hooded eyes, Lance looks up at Keith, asking a question. His fingers tug at Keith’s waistband. It’s enough to have Keith desperate, but he just swallows and slowly nods. Lance’s fingers are shaking as he pops Keith’s button open.

 

Lance does nothing for a second, and they stay there for a moment, frozen, before Lance is gently sliding Keith’s jeans the rest of the way off. He’s been wearing the same boxers for two days now, had slept in them the night before, which should have been gross. A count in the benefits column of a dream world, Keith guesses.

 

The only thing that moves about Lance is his eyes. The unnatural stillness of him has Keith’s hands reaching around Lance’s bare waist, pulling Lance towards him. Hugging has never been something Keith has been a big fan of, save for when he had been a kid and thought Shiro was the best hugger in the universe. Lance is gangly, but he loosens in Keith’s arms like a knot coming undone.

 

Lance buries his face in Keith’s neck, arms wrapping firmly around him until they are pressed together from chest to legs. Keith takes a moment to just breathe, to soak it in. Lance’s arms are tight and warm, even his fingers now as they grip onto Keith’s back. Keith lets his head rest against Lance’s and closes his eyes.

 

He isn’t sure how long they stay like that, but when they finally break apart, it’s only to wordlessly climb under the covers, Lance still in his jeans. Lance takes the place closest to the wall again, and Keith finds himself curling towards Lance’s body, one half of a parentheses.

 

“Will they all die if we leave?” Lance asks in the dark, when the lights turn themselves off once more. “Are they even alive now?”

 

Keith has no answers for him. He reaches across the bed and takes Lance’s hand.

 

“Are we?” Lance asks finally. “What if we’re dead, and this is some kind of purgatory?”

 

“We’re not dead, Lance,” Keith says calmly, gently. “We’re going to get out of here, whatever that means.”

 

* * *

 

The dreams, or memories, don’t have a start or finish. They swirl and swirl. Keith is lying in his bunk, staring at his sword and making a decision. Keith is out running danger in a hood, accompanied by others in similar hoods. Keith is disappointing the team, walking away from the team, leaving everyone, because he’s been doing his own math and coming up with something different than Lance.

 

There is one moment that sticks in Keith’s mind, although it blends in with the series of wanting, loneliness, rash decisions, wash rinse repeat of Keith’s life. Keith can place the exact moment he stops pretending he doesn’t want Lance, and just lets himself feel it. Nothing happens, no almost encounter with death. It is just Keith, alone in a room full of his fellow members of the Blade. The ache of missing Lance, the team, Shiro: it’s overwhelming, enough so that he wakes up with the morning with a bad taste in his mouth.

 

Other than that, waking up in the morning is almost anticlimactic. No gagging, no sweating. They get ready and pointedly don’t touch, just shoot each other furtive looks. Lance has an almost contemplative air about him as they devise a game plan for the day.

 

“We definitely need to start with the academic buildings,” Keith says. “We can just do what we were doing yesterday. We’ll eventually find one of them, right?”

 

Lance is frowning, staring out the window of the cafeteria. They are sitting at one of the white tables, almost pristine in condition. Keith doesn’t know how Lance didn’t realize this place was fake sooner, if he ate here all the time. Surely he knows no campus is actually this clean.

 

“I’m worried about rocking the boat too much,” Lance says after a moment. He rests his chin in his palm, still not quite looking at Keith. It irks, an itch between Keith’s shoulder blades that he can’t quite reach.

 

“I don’t think it’ll be an issue unless we make it an issue,” Keith disagrees. Lance still won’t look at him, picking idly at the piece of toast in front of him. Keith glares at it. “If we don’t think something is going to happen, I don’t think anything will.”

 

“What makes you think that?” Lance asks, fingers stopping for a second before resuming their picking.

 

Keith can’t look away, even as his own breakfast sits untouched. “Yesterday we opened nearly fifty dorm rooms, right? What’s the chance of all of those students and their roommates going to class?”

 

Lance snorts, eyes darting to Keith’s face before flickering away, up at the ceiling. Keith’s fists clench under the table. “Some people go to class.”

 

“A good amount don’t though. Even if they weren’t skipping, what’s the chances of them all having the same schedule?” Keith argues.

 

“You’ve got me there,” Lance says, looking back out the window. Anywhere, everywhere that isn’t Keith. Keith sighs inwardly. “So, what? They weren’t there because we were looking in their rooms?”

 

“They weren’t there because we weren’t expecting them to be there,” Keith says. “Maybe if we don’t expect trouble, we won’t find any.”

 

“That doesn’t sound like us,” Lance teases with a smile. He finally meets Keith’s gaze, and Keith can feel it all the way down to his toes. Lance’s eyes are sad, Keith realizes, even as he smiles. “We should get a move on.”

 

“Lead the way,” Keith says, irritation cut like a cord.

 

* * *

 

“Lance, stop freaking out!” Keith is yelling as he runs down the hallway. He’s popping into classrooms on the left while Lance takes the right. Maybe it is the simple act of running inside a school building, or the look on the faces of the various students and professors as he rushes into their class, meets every gaze, and then leaves, but Keith’s heart is tripping over itself. He needs to calm _himself_ down.

 

It doesn’t help that every time they slow down and meet each other at the stairs to take the next floor, Lance is gasping out, “We are going to get into so much trouble if we’re wrong.” They have managed to check every classroom on the first three floors, and are on their way to the fourth when they find out.

 

Campus security is intimidating, even when manned by fake burly humans versus real ones. They chase Keith and Lance down the hallway, only catching them after they open nearly every classroom door. It’s not the same as operating giant sentient alien ships against a alien species amidst the stars, but the rush of adrenaline is so painfully familiar. A lost part of Keith is welcomed back with pounding feet and Lance’s panicked laughter.

 

They weave and dart down the hallway, and while it feels erratic and unplanned, Keith finds he’s able to predict Lance’s moves. Lance highfives him as he slides into the final classroom on his knees.

 

Lance calls out, “Nope,” before following it up with a squeak as a guard catches him by the collar. Keith switches direction last second, pivoting to head in Lance’s direction when the other guard grabs him around the waist. They are manhandled down three flights of stairs, Lance pounding on the back of the guard, who had thrown Lance over his shoulder like Lance weighed nothing. Keith’s guard has Keith’s arms pressed against the small of his back, marching him down the stairs with a little more dignity until they reach the outside of the building.

 

The guard shoves Keith, tripping him as he does so, and Keith is on the asphalt, groaning. Lance is tossed with similar disregard on top of him, bruising the parts of Keith that had managed to make it this far without damage.

 

“Go back to you dorms,” one guard says with a roll of his eyes, but Lance isn’t looking at the guard; his eyes are on Keith. His lip looks split or bitten, a little bloody, but he’s smiling so carefree, sprawling over Keith’s lap with no plans to move. Keith doesn’t know what else he is supposed to do. He grips Lance’s waist with stiff fingers and leans into him. Hovering there for a minute, Keith lets their mixed panting fill his ears.

 

Lance doesn’t move away, instead weaving his fingers into Keith’s hair, and Keith closes the gap. He takes his time, gently pressing their lips together for a few moments. Lance pulls him in tighter, and Keith sighs, moving in faster. He gets lost in it, sucking on Lance’s lower lip before tracing it with his tongue lightly, working Lance’s mouth open with the tease of something more, and then kissing him deeper. Keith isn’t sure how long they lie there, but instead of feeling purged, all Keith wants is more and more.

 

When Keith finally pulls away, they pant into each other’s faces, foreheads pressed together. “Finally,” Lance breathes, and then they are both laughing again. Lance’s hands have started stroking Keith’s hair. Keith’s are under Lance’s shirt, brushing over the skin above Lance’s waistband, and it’s fucking perfect. Keith could die now, probably, and be fine with it.

 

“Uh,” says someone from behind him. “Guys?”

 

He jerks away from Lance to see Pidge, wearing a soft green sweater and a dark jean skirt. The only thing noticeably different about her from the way he has seen her in his dreams is the length of her curly hair, a single braid pinned up by a green clip. She glances from between Lance and Keith, scrunching up her nose. “Oh, boy. This just got complicated I think.”

 

“Yep,” says Hunk from behind her. His yellow jacket is unzipped, a black tank top underneath. He looks almost exactly the same as Keith’s dreams, even with an uncomfortable smile. “So, I know you guys may not remember us-”

 

“Hunk! Pidge!” Lance squeals, using Keith’s shoulders to shove himself upwards and towards their friends. Keith blinks in shock. Lance’s arms wrap tightly around the both of them, and his eyes are closed. “We’ve been looking for you guys. Don’t ever leave me again, I mean it.”

 

Pidge’s annoyed face is squished between Hunk’s arm and Lance’s stomach. “You’re pulling my hair, Lance.” She pouts and pushes herself out of Lance’s grasp. Lance just wraps himself more firmly around Hunk. “I can’t believe you guys figured it out without us. I came up with a speech and everything.”

 

“We figured it out a couple days ago,” Keith tells her as he pushes himself up. He wipes his palms off on his jeans and smiles. “I’m really glad you’re okay.”

 

Pidge makes a face, as if Keith had accidentally slipped into Korean. “Wow, that is… Yeah, I’m glad you’re okay too? Sorry, I’m just not used to you emoting beyond the extensiveness of your angst.”

 

Keith shrugs. “I don’t really remember everything yet. I’m sure all the emotional constipation will come later.”

 

“It comes in waves,” Lance says, voice muffled by Hunk’s shoulder still. He’s peering over at Keith and Pidge, half his face hidden.  

 

“Oh my god,” Hunk cheers, shooting a fist up. He beams at Keith. “He’s funny here!”

 

“Hi, Hunk,” Keith says with a small wave. He feels lighter just seeing the two of them. His eyebrows furrow as he looks at them. “I’m really glad you guys are here, but how did you find us?”

 

Pidge and Hunk exchange looks. “It wasn’t hard, considering campus security just bodily through you out of a building,” Pidge reminds Keith. She crosses her arms as she speaks, shooting a look in Lance’s direction.

 

“We also have had the campus security radio system tapped for the past week or so,” Hunk admits. “Figured they would be called in to deal with at least one of you guys.”

 

“It’s okay,” Lance says coyly. He’s standing mostly on his own now, with just an arm around Hunk’s shoulders. “You can say Keith.”

 

“Pretty sure this was your idea,” Keith reminds him, deadpan.

 

“I’ve missed you guys so much,” Hunk says, wiping away a tear.

 

“I’ve missed you too, buddy,” Lance says, and they are hugging again. Pidge takes a dramatic step away. She and Keith exchange a look.

 

“So, are we going to ignore that scene we walked in on?” Pidge asks him lowly. Keith looks at where Lance is gushing over Hunk, as Hunk gushes back, and can only shrug.

 

“I’ll keep you updated,” he decides with a small smile.

 

“Cool,” she says, eyes curious and honed on Keith. Keith feels exposed and a little embarrassed, but she doesn’t seem to hate him. She also probably does not remember a lot, maybe nothing about him and Lance. Maybe all her memories are about other things.

 

“Are we talking about the forehead touching?” Hunk asks, finally pulling Lance off of him. He squints his eyes in Pidge and Keith’s direction.  

 

Pidge shoots Keith an assessing look. Whatever she sees on his face seems to be enough, because she baldly just states, “Yep.”

 

Lance’s face is pink as he crosses his arms. He leans towards Pidge, bending down a little to be on her eye level. “You’re just jealous, pipsqueak.”

 

“Of what? You finally getting your mack on with Keith’s mullet?” Pidge asks. She tucks one of her curls behind her ear as she says it.

 

“It’s not even a mullet anymore!” Lance walks over to Keith and wraps an arm around his waist. He leans into Keith, smiling coyly. “Don’t listen to the haters, babe.”

 

Keith wants to kiss him again. He also wants to maybe not be having this discussion with their friends just yet. “You secretly liked my mullet.”

 

Lance gasps, hand over his heart. “My own Keith has betrayed me. At least I have you, Hunk.” He bats his eyelashes in Hunk’s direction.

 

With a shrug, Hunk admits, “Pidge and I had an almost serious bet going back at the Garrison.” Lance eyes both Hunk and Pidge, who turns her head and pretends to not have been listening to their conversation.

 

“Really?” Lance whines. “You didn’t have faith in me?”

 

“More like we didn’t have faith in your heterosexuality.” Hunk rubs his chin. Keith feels his whole body lock up. He can’t look away from Hunk’s sheepish expression as Hunk watches Lance’s face go through a myriad of expressions.

 

Lance’s playfulness dies away, leaving something like curiosity. His eyes are wide as he asks Hunk, “Oh, like, for real?”

 

Pidge just shrugs, but Hunk seems a little more apologetic, rubbing the back of his head. “I always thought you had a crush on him, at the Garrison, but that you just weren’t ready to deal with it yet.”

 

“What about Keith, though?” Lance asks. “There was no way you could have known-”

 

“Okay, guys, let’s focus,” Pidge interrupts. Keith can feel his lungs start to work again, and he shoots her an appreciative look. “As exciting as all this romance in the air is, we need to find a way back.”

 

The bell sounds, and people start filing out of the buildings. Keith looks around. The questions that had chased Lance and Keith back to Lance’s dorm leave him uncomfortable as they begin to surround his team. “I know they’re not real, but maybe we should take this somewhere more private,” he says, eyes darting from fake face to fake face.

 

“We can go back to my dorm,” Pidge offers. Lance and Keith just barely avoid looking at each other too obviously.

 

“That’s okay, Pidge. I think mine is closer,” Lance says quickly, throwing an arm over Pidge’s shoulder. Pidge wiggles her nose but allows it for a moment as they all start walking. It’s also significantly cleaner, but no one says anything. “What are you doing here anyways, Pidge? Aren’t you, like, twelve?”

 

“I’m sixteen, and you know that,” she grumbles. “You’re only two years older.”

 

“How old is Keith?” Hunk asks. Everyone pauses to turn and look at him. He can feel himself starting to blush a little under the intense scrutiny of not just Pidge and Hunk trying to figure him out, but Lance’s eyes obviously moving up and down Keith’s body before Lance winks.

 

“Uh,” Keith says smartly, looking down at himself. Keith returns their stares with his hand help up a hand in a half-shrug. “Honestly, I don’t know. Did I get a growth spurt or something? I always feel… Shorter in my dreams.”

 

“We’ll probably figure it out sooner or later,” Pidge says after everyone looks around at each other in silence. “It’s okay, Grandpa. Sometimes you just want to relive your youth.”

 

“Why are you calling me grandpa? Shiro’s the one with the white hair,” Keith says with a roll of his eyes.

 

“Only partially, and it’s obviously from the weight of his trauma,” Hunk says as they walk. He stops abruptly, causing Lance to run straight into him, even though he doesn’t seem to notice. “You don’t think Shiro’s here too, do you?”

 

Lance pushes himself off of Hunk’s back and turns to look at Keith with a small, reassuring smile. “He spoke to me, actually. I think he’s on the outside, waiting for us to wake up,” Keith tells the group.

 

Pidge also turns to look at him, wisely keeping her pace. “He was able to communicate with you? That’s weird, but that might be helpful. Maybe we can get messages out to him, too.”

 

“I don’t think so. I think we have to wait till the end of the reel,” Lance says. When everyone stops and looks at him to elaborate, he continues. “It’s in chronological order, so there has to be an end. It’s like a movie reel. Once we get to the end, maybe we can break out.”

 

“That’s a good point,” Pidge says.

 

They continue walking to Lance’s dorm in silence, all caught up with thoughts on their situation. Lance floats back a little to walk, letting Hunk and Pidge lead them into the building, till he’s keeping pace next to Keith. Their hands brush, and for a second, Lance’s pinky finger hooks around Keith’s. He holds it as they walk up to Lance’s floor, and only breaks it when he has to open the door.

 

Hunk immediately lies down on the freshly made bed, and Pidge folds into a seated position on the floor, her legs crossed. Keith sits next to her, letting his legs stretch out in front of him. Lance leans against his bed frame.

 

“Home sweet home,” Lance says sarcastically. He’s looking at Hunk on the bed, and Keith can’t help but wonder if he’s thinking about how they had woken up this morning, curled around each other, before Lance had pulled away.

 

“It looks like you barely stay here,” Pidge comments, taking in every non-detail. Her eyebrow twitches. “How did it take you so long to figure it out?”

 

“I didn’t,” Lance admits, picking at his nails. He doesn’t look up as he adds, “Keith had to tell me.”

 

Pidge turns to give Keith a questioning look. Keith holds his hands up. “Honestly, it took Shiro talking to me in my dream for me to figure it out.”

 

“Pidge had to tell me. Which was very odd, having a tiny underage girl run into the Culinary Arts department and demand to talk to me, even though we’d never met before,” Hunk says, laying on his side to face her. She shrugs and pushes her glasses up her nose.

 

“You were going to be the easiest to find,” Pidge says. She shoots Keith and Lance a thoughtful look.

 

“Culinary Arts,” Lance gasps. He nudges Keith’s ankle with his foot. “Why didn’t we think of that?”

 

“We thought Pidge would be easier to find first,” Keith reminds him.

 

“We figured you had probably realized,” Lance says, nodding as if it is all coming back to him.

 

“Well, I did. It only took me a week,” Pidge states, tone dry. Shocked silence follows, before Lance and Hunk crow.

 

“A week?” Hunk sits up and levels an amazed look at her. He holds out a hand for a high-five that she quietly takes him up on.

 

“What the fuck, Pidge? What took you so long finding us?” Lance demands. Keith can’t read the expression on his face, but he still reaches up and over to pat Lance’s leg.

 

“What Lance probably means is how did you figure it out so fast, and why didn’t you say something sooner?” Keith shoots Lance a reproachful look. Lance glares in his direction before rolling his eyes.

 

“Sure, whatever. Go with that,” Lance grumbles, turning to Pidge with expectation.

 

Pidge folds her legs under herself, straightening out her skirt. “I’m in the advanced program, in computer sciences, and we were trying to create an A.I., which had always been my dream while I was growing up. Matt and I would talk about it all the time. I was super excited about it, but as the week went on, it was all just the same data, over and over. Like the same pattern kept repeating, no matter what I changed. That doesn’t happen in real life.” Her eyes are a little wide as she finishes.

 

“That was the most simply you’ve ever stated anything,” is Lance’s awed response. Keith shoots him a look that Lance doesn’t not turn away from Pidge to see.

 

“It didn’t really make a lot of sense. Whoever put us here, I don’t think they know much about Earth.” Pidge sighs, her hand absentmindedly pushing some of the hair out of her face. “That was when the dreams started, though. It was Matt, you know, like all the times when I was a kid, and we would pretend we were mad scientists. Then I started dreaming about you guys, and I just _knew_.”

 

“My dreams started out probably around that time, but they were always about you and Lance,” Hunk says. He had sat up at some point, and his legs are now kicking against the bed in a pattern. Lance gives Hunk a heartbreakingly soft smile.

 

“Aw, buddy, I dreamed about you too,” Lance coos, leaning over to elbow Hunk gently.

 

“Yeah, some of them were about you guys, I guess,” Pidge admits. “But mostly about science.”

 

“Sure, Pidge,” Hunk says. Lance nudges her with his foot, and she smacks it out of her space.

 

“Watch your shoes, lover boy,” she says with an eye roll, but she’s also smiling. Keith aches a little watching them, but he looks up at Lance, who is already looking at him, and his heart nearly stops in his chest.

 

Lance’s soft smile is something Keith is still not used to having directed at him. He wants to carry it around with him, a lucky charm Keith doesn’t ever want to lose.

 

“My dreams didn’t start until I met Lance here,” Keith tells the group, eyes not moving from Lance’s. They all turn towards him, quiet, as if expecting more. Keith doesn’t really have anything to give them. Lance turns a sweet darker shade, looking away.  

 

Keith thinks of the uncountable amount of time when he hadn’t known Lance. How long have they been floating in this dream space? Enough to have developed lives, memories, hobbies, he guesses.

 

“How long do you think we’ve been here?” Hunk asks, echoing what everyone must be thinking. Everyone’s face is drawn with worry when Keith looks around.

 

“We should just focus on finding a way out of here,” Keith says, derailing the pity party while they are all ahead.

 

“I think Lance might be onto something. The only real movement in time is the amount of memories that we make it through in the night. Have you noticed how some days will go faster than others?” Pidge asks. Her eyebrows are furrowed as she thinks.

 

“The problem is without our memories is we don’t know the timeline, or how far along we are along it now,” Hunk says. “What if we aren’t even halfway through, yet?”

 

“Then we better get on it,” Keith says, frowning.

 

Lance looks around the room and claps his hands together, causing Hunk to jump. “Okay, guys. Enough sad faces, because you know what this means? Sleep over time!”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so........................ i have six days to get the final two or three chapters posted................ and they aren't written yet. to everyone who has read this fic and not tried to find me for murder purposes, thanks. love you bye

They end up piling most of the blankets on the floor and splitting them. Pidge is outvoted and is forced to sleep on the bed, despite her protests of not needing chivalry when they were in a dream world anyways. Hunk takes the only other pillow and a blanket, leaving the last two blankets for Lance and Keith. 

 

Lying down, facing each other, they listen to the other two snore. Pidge lets out a soft, snuffling sound that is strangely endearing, although Keith would rather die than tell her so. If Keith ignores the noise, it almost feels as if it is just him and Lance alone in this room again. The darkness had settled some time ago, and Keith wonders what time it actually is in the real world.

 

“Why aren’t you sleeping?” Lance finally asks, despite his eyes being wide open as well. 

 

Keith doesn’t know what to say. He tries to want to go back home. The universe needs them, depends on them. 

 

Here, though, is where Keith gets to kiss Lance. Lance looks at him, and they can say a hundred different things without speaking a word. This is where Lance is reaching across the space between them and weaving their fingers together over the blankets. 

 

“I don’t want it to be over yet, either,” Lance admits quietly, shamefully, even though Keith has not said a word. “I don’t know what will happen when we get there.”  _ I don’t know if this will last _ , he doesn’t say, but Keith hears it louder than anything. Keith closes his eyes, willing himself to be okay with letting it all go 

 

“Maybe it won’t work,” Keith says softly. He uses his free hand to run his thumb over Lance’s cheekbone. Brushing hair back from Lance’s ear, Keith lets himself soak it all in. “I wish I had kissed you before today. Or that I hadn’t ignored you before, when I figured it out. We could have spent so much time like this instead.”

 

Lance sighs, blowing air against Keith’s wrist. It makes Keith shiver a little, but he doesn’t move away. “This is why you should listen to me more. I tried to tell you.”

 

With a smirk, Keith scoots a little closer. “You’re right. You have good ideas sometimes.”

 

“Sometimes?” Lance admonishes quietly, also moving in.

 

“Rarely,” Keith agrees. “Honestly, it’s a miracle I listen to you at all.”

 

“Rude, I’m an idea guy. I’ve got plans for days. This, right here, what we’re doing? Is my plan. I always save everyone’s ass. It’s like, my thing,” Lance tells him. His hand flexes where it’s wrapped around Keith’s. 

 

“I’m going to miss you,” Keith says, and it falls into the small space between them like a stone in water. “This you, I mean.”

 

“I think I’m the same me, no matter where we are,” Lance admits. “I think you’re same too, somewhere in there, under all the isolation and mommy issues.”

 

Keith rolls his eyes, moving as if to pull away from Lance. Lance only holds on tighter. “On second thought, I take it back. I can’t wait to get back to real Lance.”

 

“Real Lance won’t hold your hand like this, I bet,” Lance says, laughing lightly. Keith tightens his grip on Lance’s hand to match, trying to smile back. 

 

“You’re probably right. I’ll miss this part,” Keith tells him, too serious, too sad. Lance moves his head against Keith’s. It kills him to say, but Keith forces himself. “We should try to sleep at least.”

 

“I know.” Lance bites his lip. Checking to make sure both Pidge and Hunk are still knocked out, Lance works himself up onto one arm. He leans over and presses his dry mouth against Keith’s, lingering. It wracks a shiver through Keith’s body, the heat of Lance’s body so close, even through the blankets. Lance’s fingers find their way back to Keith’s hair, curling around the back of Keith’s neck, and Keith presses their lips together more firmly. 

 

The kiss turns into something soft and open, Keith urging Lance closer, and Lance panting into Keith’s mouth. When Lance pulls back, Keith doesn’t want to let him go. “I’m definitely going to miss that,” Keith whispers, voice harsh in the heavy silence of their breathing.

 

Lance closes his eyes, as if pained. “I really do like you, even if I don’t know it there.”

 

“It’s okay, Lance,” Keith tells him. Unable to help himself, he leans forward and kisses Lance again, softly, chaste. “I really like you too.”

 

Lance lets Keith get away with one more kiss before he lies back down. Squeezing Keith’s hand, Lance says, “Goodnight, Keith.”

 

“Goodnight, Lance.”

 

* * *

 

The Blade becomes his new place. He carves a shape for himself there, and it never feels forced or awkward. There are no gaps to cross, no bridges to build, because everyone in the Blade is trying not to make connections, not the other way around. Keith’s loneliness fits here too, when before it had felt like an extra large coat that took up too much space around him, keeping the others at bay. 

 

Keith goes on missions and misses Shiro’s voice. He guards one of the other members as they steal intel, and misses Pidge and Hunk. Eating in rows and rows of nameless figures, and misses Allura’s welcoming smile and Coran’s haphazard affection. And of course, Lance, who Keith finds himself thinking about constantly. 

 

He could write lovesick poetry at this point about being so far away from Lance. Sometimes he’ll realize he’s agonizing about the people Keith will never meet but that Lance has flirted with in Keith’s absence. What if it actually works one day, the awkward flirting and touching, and Keith won’t be there to see it happen? 

 

Keith doesn’t regret his time with the Blade, but it does create a hole inside him. He already feels holey enough, cave system carved somewhere underneath his ribcage, and adding another makes him a little unstable. Keith starts making some close calls, starts trying to bridge the gap between him and the other members of the Blade the way he had tried with Voltron. 

 

When he wakes, the sound of an explosion is ringing in his ears. Keith gasps, and looks around the room to see, with a heavy wave of relief that is quickly mixed with guilt, that he is still in Lance’s dorm room. It hadn’t worked.

 

His teammates all seem to stir within seconds of his waking, Pidge eyeballing him irritably from the bed. Hunk is hunched over the pillow instead of using it for his head, and his snores cut off abruptly. Lance’s face is pressed into Keith’s shoulder, arm draped over Keith’s stomach. At least Keith’s shirt has lasted the night this time. Lance groans, and heat warms Keith’s arm, even through the fabric.  

 

Lance’s eyes snap open, and he jerks away, eyes wide and red as he looks at Pidge and Hunk before turning towards Keith. Lance’s shoulders sink down, but Keith cannot tell if it is relief or disappointment. 

 

“Well,” Pidge says from where she has sat up in bed. She rubs an eye from under her glasses. Keith is unsure if she usually sleeps in them, or if she just felt uncomfortable taking them off last night. “I guess it makes sense it didn’t work in one night.”

 

The disappointment in her tone only makes Keith feel worse for the lightness in his stomach. Hunk rolls over onto his back, legs and arms spread out. 

 

“I miss the Yellow Lion,” Hunk tells them all. “And the rest of the team.”

 

“I miss Matt,” Pidge says, so sad and soft. “I think I was really close to finding him this time.”

 

“I left you guys there,” Keith states, thinking about his dark dreams. “It’s kind of nice to wake up here and see you all.”

 

Everyone snaps their attention to him, the shock palpable. Pidge boggles. Hunk’s mouth is dangling open. Only Lance is staring at him with something akin to understanding. There is something else in his eyes that Keith can’t quite place, and Lance is leaning away from Keith the smallest amount. 

 

Pidge is looking between Lance and Keith when Keith turns back to her and Hunk. “We miss you too,” she says. “It’s weird, not having you there, but we understand why you left.”

 

“Yeah, you’re more of an action guy,” Hunk agrees. His face is thoughtful but kind. “Wish you had been there for a couple of our adventures though.”

 

“What about you, Lance?” Pidge asks, raising an eyebrow. “What did you dream about?”

 

Lance’s face goes a shade darker. Keith frowns as Lance waves them off. “Does it really matter? It’s not like talking about it’s going to get us back any faster.” 

 

Keith’s frown deepens. Hunk just snickers. 

 

“Definitely about Allura, then,” Hunk says with the air of teasing. Lance freezes, gaze whipping around to meet Keith’s. 

 

“Hunk,” Pidge says, pushing herself out of bed. She straightens her jacket, but her hair is half stuck to her head in a frizzy halo. “Do you think you can still access the kitchens even though you haven’t really gone to class?” 

 

Hunk comes alive at the suggestion, also standing. “We are going to find out. Onwards!” He rushes out the door, the blanket he had been using falling sadly to the floor. Pidge walks slower, giving Lance and Keith a wide berth as she goes. 

 

“We’ll bring you back breakfast,” Pidge says with a wave as she goes. The door closes, and Lance is not looking at Keith. 

 

“Okay. That was weird, right?” Keith asks slowly. Lance shifts awkwardly, rubbing his face before turning to face Keith. 

 

“They’re just unsubtle,” Lance says miserably. He sighs. “Keith, things might be a little more complicated than I thought.”

 

Keith’s heart stops. He snorts, pushing it away. “What do you mean? It isn’t complicated enough with everything else?”

 

“My dreams… You’re not the only person I dream about,” Lance says quickly, like a confession. Keith doesn’t understand. 

 

“You’re not the only one I dream about either,” Keith responds, almost immediately. “I dream about everyone.”

 

“No, I mean.” Lance takes a sharp breath. “You’re not the person I like, in my dreams.”

 

Keith’s blood runs cold. The jealousy in his dreams on a faceless someone wakes in his veins. “Oh,” is all he can say. Lance’s shoulders slump, his expression almost desperate when he finally looks at Keith.

 

“Is that all you can say?” Lance asks, imploring. His hands have started up a nervous staccato on his covered legs. 

 

“I don’t know what else to say,” Keith admits. His chest is cold, every bit of him creaking as he forces himself to move, to straighten and face Lance. Hunk’s words resettle in his brain, and he forces himself to ask, “Is it? Allura, I mean.”

 

Lance is still, but damning, as he says, “I don’t know when it started, but I just kind of… Like her, I guess?” 

 

Keith is falling inside of himself. The negative pressure sucks the air out of his lungs. He doesn’t recognize his own voice as he says, “Okay.”

 

“‘Okay’? Is it? Really?” Lance demands, turning. His eyes are wide, wild. That feeling of knowing that Lance needs something from Keith that Keith isn’t sure he has in him, that he can actually give, sits poorly inside him. 

 

“What else am I supposed to say, Lance?” Keith snaps. The void inside him lights like a pyre. “None of this is even fucking real anyways.”

 

Lance is stricken, hands still. He searches Keith’s face, and Keith is suddenly so fucking sick of it, all the looking and wanting and not being able to have anything at all. Keith stands, shoving the blankets off of him as he goes. He walks to the door, not bothering to look at Lance, even as Lance says, just once, soft enough Keith can barely hear him, “Don’t go.”

 

Keith slams the door behind himself. 

 

* * *

 

Keith wanders around campus for a little bit, but when the amount of heads turning in his direction starts to get a little too high, Keith makes his way to the cafeteria. 

 

It’s deserted when Keith walks in, and Keith releases a little of the tension he has been carrying around with him since he left Lance in the dorm this morning. He makes his way behind the line, pushing into the equally empty kitchens.

 

Hunk is in a chef’s hat, pulling biscuits out of the oven. Pidge is perched on top of the counter next to him, feet swinging as she chomps down on an apple. They both turn to Keith before looking at each other. 

 

“Didn’t go well then?” Hunk asks gently.  _ They knew _ , Keith realizes, and it burns going down like swallowing hot wax. 

 

Pidge just watches him, expressionless, before patting the clear spot of counter next to her. “Come sit down. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

 

Keith takes a seat next to her, barely having to jump to reach the counter. She offers him an apple from the bowl of fruit behind her, piled on top of a carton of eggs and next to a tub of butter. Keith accepts, biting into it with viciousness. 

 

“Do you? Want to talk about it?” she asks calmly. Keith knows he could say no, and neither one of them would bring it up again. Instead, he just shrugs. He chews thoughtfully.

 

“It must have started when I left, right?” Keith asks after a moment. Hunk snorts from where he has started to stir a goopy brown mixture. It smells like cinnamon, and Keith’s mouth waters even more. 

 

“She doesn’t like him back. She’s got a thing going on with Lotor, of all people,” Hunk tells him. “Lance is just kind of hopeless. You know how he gets.”

 

When Keith’s silence draws on, Hunk gives him a sheepish smile. 

 

“Sorry, sometimes I forget you weren’t really with us at the Garrison. Lance acts all flirty, but when it’s someone he really likes, he always tries too hard. I’ve never seen it work on-” Hunk stops, giving Keith another look. He corrects himself. “I’ve only seen it work on one person before.”

 

Keith can feel embarrassment like a itchy rash under his skin. “I’ve liked Lance for a long time,” he says, out loud and serious. 

 

Pidge’s chewing is the only sound as Hunk starts pouring his concoction onto the cooling biscuits. “I had no idea, if that makes you feel any better,” Pidge says, mouth half full. “Otherwise I would have tried to set you guys up a while ago.”

 

“Yeah, it’s pretty obvious he likes you now,” Hunk says conversationally, as if it doesn’t rip Keith up inside. He stares at the green apple in his hand. 

 

“He likes Allura, in the real world,” Keith states, cool as he can. Pidge rolls her eyes. 

 

“Real, fake, whatever. Everything that is happening right now is happening to us, even if we can’t remember everything that happened before now. This is just as real as that is,” Pidge says quickly. “Even if this is the dream and we all forget it when we wake up, right now, we are experiencing all of it. Every emotion, every thought is real, because it’s real to us. Whatever is happening there doesn’t change what is here.”

 

Hunk pauses in his work to look Keith in the eye as he says, “What Pidge is trying to say if that you guys seem kind of happy here. Maybe don’t ruin it because it’s not true out there. We all run around, almost dying all the time. I think we’re allowed to latch onto the happiness where we find it.”

 

“Maybe,” Keith says slowly. “But what if we get back, remember it all, and Lance feels like I took advantage of him? What if he doesn’t feel the same there, and all I have are memories from a world where he did?” 

 

Pidge and Hunk are silent. Pidge continues to chew. Hunk has gone back to finishing his breakfast pastries. They let Keith’s questions hang. 

 

“I know for a fact Lance won’t blame you for his own emotions here, no matter what,” Pidge says, after the silence draws on for so long, Keith wonders if he had spoken out loud at all. “As for that last one, I don’t know. I guess you have to decide is it worth it.”

 

“Is it better to have love and lost, than to have never loved at all?” Hunk asks pompously, holding out an apple on his palm. When Pidge and Keith just blink at him, he hunches a little defensively before shrugging. “You know, like the poet said?”

 

“Sure,” Pidge says, blankly. 

 

“Uh-huh,” Keith agrees. They take bites of their apples. Hunk awkwardly smiles.

 

“It’s creepy that you guys did that in sync,” Hunk states. “Maybe keep the creep factor in check while we’re floating in a dream world?”

 

“Maybe,” Pidge says.

 

“Sure,” Keith says at the same time. 

 

Hunk frowns. 

 

“Well, I’m done here,” Hunk says instead of commenting. He waves at the biscuits, piled with a cinnamon apple topping and whipped cream. “Bone apple teeth.” 

 

“Let’s take some to Lance. I’m sure he’s done crying and licking his wounds if you want to apologize,” Pidge says, jumping off the counter. She throws her apple core into the trash can. Keith pushes himself down and follows her. 

 

“Who says I need to apologize?” Keith grumbles. 

 

“You wouldn’t be here talking to us if you had bothered to actually talk to Lance about it all,” Hunk answers instead. He piles all the dirty pans and pots on the counter, grabbing the box of neatly stacked pastries. “Alright, let’s go.”

 

* * *

 

Keith does not apologize. Lance says nothing to him, even when it seems he cannot look away. Keith takes his stares and quiet questioning, ignoring all of it. 

 

Part of him wants it to be better this way, leave it here and never experience Lance’s awkward hands fumbling with Keith’s clothes or Lance’s mouth find Keith’s in the dark again. The other part of him just aches, but he’s used to it. He would even go so far as to say he’s got a tolerance for it, a skill he’s honed in the lonely openness of space. 

 

They spend most of the day in Lance’s dorm, only leaving to follow Hunk to the kitchen when they are too hungry or bored to do anything else. The only tension that comes from anywhere other than Keith ignoring Lance’s existence is when Hunk pauses from where he has started dealing out cards for their third game of Go Fish to ask, “Wait, is Allura here?”

 

Keith can’t meet anyone’s eye, especially not Lance’s. He stares at his cards instead. 

 

“Should we look for her?” Pidge asks. Keith has to look up at her tone. She is already looking at him, and he realizes she had been asking him, not the group at large. 

 

Keith takes a breath, pushing away all the uncertainty and roiling emotions that rise up in his throat as he thinks. “Honestly, there’s no way of knowing. We don’t even know how we’re all in the same dream.”

 

“Do Alteans dream like we do?” Hunk asks, obviously not expecting an answer. “Because if they don’t, and whatever has happened to us, happened to Allura too, it’s possible she’s just by herself somewhere.”

 

They all let that soak in. 

 

“I have to get some air,” Lance says, pushing himself up from the ground, cards abandoned. Keith can’t watch him go, can barely keep himself together just sitting in his spot. 

 

Pidge’s expression turns sharp as she crosses her arms expectantly. “Well? Are you going to go after him?”

 

Keith looks at her, letting his helplessness show. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to say to him, Pidge. ‘Sorry the girl you like in the real world might be alone and unaware she’s even dreaming, hey, by the way, I think I want to go back to holding hands’?” 

 

Pidge huffs. “Do I look like I have all the answers for you?” 

 

“She’s right,” Hunk says, after a second of silence that drags. “You should go after him. I would, but I don’t think I can really help him feel better right now.”

 

“You’d be better at it than me,” Keith reminds him.

 

“It doesn’t have to be good,” Hunk disagrees. “He already knows I’m here for him if he wants to talk. He wants you.” 

 

The words hit like a suckerpunch. 

 

Keith takes only another minute before he pushes himself up, leaving his cards next to Lance’s. 

 

Finding Lance is another matter entirely. The campus is huge, had taken Keith hours to ride by on his bike. He knows Lance couldn’t have gotten very far, very fast, but if the dream is willing to bend reality for them, maybe it would help Lance cover more ground faster. 

 

In any case, Keith finds himself running. He doesn’t know really where he’s going until he’s reached the building. He looks up at the lit but empty classrooms. Taking a deep breath, he walks into the hallway and up the stairs. 

 

The classroom looks like any other classroom, but Keith knows that it’s the same one he and Lance had been going to class together in. Lance is sitting at his desk, head down and hands in his hair. Keith just stands in the doorway for a moment, watching Lance breathe.

 

When the door closes behind Keith, Lance looks up, startled. His eyes are red and a little watery, expression defeated. It breaks Keith’s heart, cracks him open. Keith walks over to Lance, kneeling on the ground by Lance’s legs. 

 

Lance just watches him, sad and confused. “Keith, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

 

“It’s okay,” Keith says, and just like that, it is. “It’s got to be confusing. I’m sorry I yelled at you this morning.”

 

Lance’s leg starts to bounce. Keith reaches up and rests his hand on Lance’s knee. “Do you really think she’s alone in a world like this somewhere?” Lance asks, sounding hollowed out by the idea of it. Keith can share the sentiment. The idea of Allura suffering through all of this alone, not knowing what was real or fake or some combination of the two, hurts Keith just to consider. 

 

“I don’t know, but I know if she is, she’s probably already found a way out of there,” Keith says, honestly. 

 

Lance snorts, rubbing his face. “You’re right. If she was here, we would have been out weeks ago.”

 

Keith smiles a little. “Maybe.” He tightens his grip on Lance’s knee, and Lance’s eyes are so blue, Keith could drown in them. “Lance, I-”

 

“I understand,” Lance says, holding a hand up. Keith’s heart stops in his chest. “You don’t have to explain. I really get it.” 

 

“No, Lance, I think-” Once again, Lance interrupts him, eyes imploring as he looks at Keith’s face. Lance raises his hand, using his fingers to caress Keith’s cheek. Lance tucks a lock of hair behind Keith’s hair, and Keith has to close his eyes because the idea of never having this again guts him. 

 

“Keith,” Lance begs, quiet and close as he leans into Keith. “Please. I can’t hear you say it.” 

 

Keith’s eyes snap open. If he thought he had been falling apart before, it doesn’t even come close to what he feels now. Lance holds no expression beyond acceptance and calm, watery red eyes and all. “Why?” is all Keith can ask. 

 

“If you don’t say it, I can still pretend that this is all real,” Lance answers. He strokes Keith’s hair again, so soft that it breaks Keith. 

 

“It is real for me,” Keith tells him in a rush. “All of it is real for me. Even there.”

 

Lance’s eyes go wide, hand freezing against Keith’s face. “What?” 

 

“I am so ridiculously besotted with you,” Keith confesses in a rush. “Part of the reason I left, was  _ for _ you, so you wouldn’t feel out of place anymore, but in the memories, you’re all I think about. Everything I feel here, I feel it there. This is all so painfully real for me, Lance, I can’t stand the idea of going back, and you not wanting me there too.”

 

“Oh,” Lance exhales, other hand coming up to cup Keith’s cheek. “ _ Keith _ .” 

 

Keith moves upwards the same time Lance moves down. They meet in the middle, teeth clacking gently at first, but Keith directs Lance with a soft grip on the back of Lance’s neck. His fingers curl into the hair at the base of Lance’s neck as he pushes Lance backwards, kissing him deeper. Lance can only hold on and let himself be kissed, but Keith can’t stop pressing his mouth against Lance’s, can’t stop when his tongue works its way in. 

 

Lance moans, soft and breathy, into Keith’s mouth, and Keith is on fire. He wants everything, wants to take Lance apart right here in the classroom they met for the second time in. He could go back to his knees right now, make sure Lance has some real memories to carry back into the waking world with him. 

 

Instead he pulls away, rests his forehead against Lance’s. Lance is dazed, panting, and the fire in Keith’s belly demands more. Keith just holds him instead, wraps his arms around Lance’s shoulders awkwardly. Keith’s lower back reminds him he has been more or less hunched over for however long he has been kissing Lance, and Keith winces as he moves back.

 

“Oh,” Lance says again, pupils swallowing the blue of his irises. “ _ Oh _ .”

 

“Is that all you can say?” Keith teases, voice hoarser than he can remember it being. 

 

Lance stands, moving right into Keith’s space with a soft, sexy grin that revives the urgency in Keith. “I could be saying nothing at all.”

 

They don’t leave the classroom for a while. 


End file.
